After being heckled in Assam, Bengali poet Srijato Bandopadhyay says ‘intolerance spreading, I feel insecure in my country’ 

Srijato Bandopadhyay

Bengali poet Srijato Bandopadhyay was booed and heckled at an event in Assam’s Silchar, on Saturday, by suspected members of Hindutva organizations. After the incident, the far-left intellectual said he doesn’t feel secure in the country anymore.

Srijato, who goes by his first name, said, “Intolerance is spreading, I feel insecure in my own country. People like us have no freedom of speech. The axe is falling on free thinkers. In my state (West Bengal) I am secure, but we must often go out for cultural program and recital sessions.”

The poet was invited to inaugurate a cultural event organized by a cultural group called “Esho Boli” in Silchar. When the program started, a group of people stormed in and snatched microphone. They started to question him about the poem he wrote in 2017, which the poet wrote on the same day Yogi Adityanath swore as the chief minister of Uttar Pradesh.

Srijato said, “That (controversy over the poem) happened long back … I thought that the issue has died out.”

Srijato had to be rescued from the stage by armed personnel of the Assam Police. Later, the West Bengal chief minister, Mamta Banerjee later called him to assure him the security.

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