Mother Language Day irony: Bengal’s political discourse hits new low ahead of 2026 polls

Kolkata (PTI): Bengal’s sharp political wit is increasingly giving way to personal attacks, crude exchanges and combative rhetoric, with observers warning that the language of politics has hit an all-time low ahead of the 2026 assembly elections, overshadowing policy debates with bitter trading of barbs.

If Bengal’s politics once thrived on layered wit and ideological jousts, today’s exchanges resemble rapid-fire duels crafted for viral circulation. Across the TMC, BJP, CPI(M) and the Congress, leaders blame one another for coarsening public discourse, even as critics say all camps are complicit.

The irony of International Mother Language Day exists. The land that produced Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore and poet Nazrul Islam now finds its political stage dominated by jibes that trend faster than arguments.

Earlier, from Marxist satire to Congress repartee and TMC’s street-smart rhetoric, language was an art form, sharp but seldom crudely personal.

State Parliamentary Affairs Minister Sobhandeb Chattopadhyay acknowledged the decline, but framed it as a broader social shift.

“Earlier, we criticised ideologies and political paths, but not in a disrespectful manner. There has been a serious decline in tolerance and patience among people. Politicians must remember that words spoken today can return as a boomerang tomorrow,” the 82-year-old TMC leader said.

Chattopadhyay argued that debates once centred on principles, whereas “now politics has largely become a scramble for power”, a transformation he believes has inevitably affected language.

State BJP president Samik Bhattacharya, a quintessential Bengali bhadralok, condemned what he described as “institutionalised aggression” in political speeches, warning that personal insinuations were replacing substantive critique.

Veteran Congress leader Pradip Bhattacharya called the current moment “an all-time low”, lamenting that ideological contestation has given way to personalised attacks.

“One of the most significant reasons for this deterioration is the decline in intellectual depth among political leaders. Earlier, politicians read literature, philosophy and history. They had intellectual discipline and a broader worldview. Today, politics is confined to the immediate and the superficial,” he said.

The 81-year-old politician argued that audiences have changed.

“If a leader uses abusive language, sections of the crowd applaud. Political discourse has become coarser. Politics, in many ways, has turned into a closed pond. When it becomes insular and intellectually stagnant, degeneration is inevitable," he said.

The CPI (M), attempting to reassert itself after years of electoral decline, has been particularly vocal about what it terms a “collapse of political culture”.

Left leaders frequently contrast today’s verbal exchanges with an earlier era of structured ideological battles between Marxists, Congress stalwarts and emerging regional forces.

TMC’s Kunal Ghosh argued that the deterioration did not begin yesterday. He blamed the CPI(M)’s long tenure for institutionalising confrontational political behaviour, claiming that the opposition now complains about a culture it once nurtured.

Educationist Pabitra Sarkar attributed the coarsening of political language to wider societal erosion, saying, “This is not limited to West Bengal; it is happening across the country. Politics reflects society. When social values decline, political discourse inevitably follows.”

Sugata Bose, the history professor at Harvard University, traced the shift to the absence of towering leaders who once shaped Bengal’s political imagination.

“One of the major reasons for the decline is that we no longer have leaders of the stature we once had in pre- and post-Independence eras. Earlier, politics and debates were based on ideology and policy. Now politics is about capturing power and money,” the grandnephew of Netaji Subha Chandra Bose and former TMC MP told PTI.

Bengal once prided itself on formidable orators - B.C. Roy, Jyoti Basu, Pranab Mukherjee, Prafull Sen, Ajoy Mukherjee, Somnath Chatterjee, A.B.A. Ghani Khan Choudhury, Indrajit Gupta and Bhupesh Gupta -who differed sharply in ideology but kept debate rooted in policy and constitutional rigour, and never descending into personal rancour.

Political analyst Moidul Islam placed the change within a broader 15-year arc of “depoliticisation”.

“Bengal was historically known for deep political engagement. Today, that space has shrunk. When substantive ideological positions weaken, politics degenerates into personality-driven rivalries and verbal abuse,” he said.

Campaign strategists admit that sharp barbs energise cadres and dominate news cycles. Rally speeches increasingly include real-time rebuttals to opponents’ remarks, creating a loop of accusation and counter-accusation.

Social media has accelerated the shift. Short, provocative lines travel instantly, rewarding those who compress aggression into shareable clips while nuanced arguments struggle for attention in the algorithm-driven arena.

As the 2026 polls near, some insiders expect the tone to soften to attract undecided voters, while others believe attacks will intensify as the contest tightens.

International Mother Language Day thus arrives steeped in irony.

Leaders celebrate linguistic pride and Bengal’s literary legacy, only to wield the same language as a political weapon.

The concern now is not volume but values, whether Bengal can reclaim civility and ideological depth before the 2026 assembly contest intensifies.