Trinamool Congress MLA Humayun Kabir, who was suspended after he announced plans to build a replica of the Babri Masjid in Murshidabad, has declared that he will work to stop Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee from winning a fourth term next year. Kabir said the Trinamool’s support among Muslims will collapse and warned Mamata Banerjee that the real political drama is yet to come.
In an interview with NDTV, a day after he laid the foundation for the proposed Babri Masjid in Beldanga, Kabir said he will launch his own party on December 22. He said he hopes to ally with Hyderabad MP Asaduddin Owaisi’s AIMIM. Kabir said he plans to contest 135 of Bengal’s 294 seats in the 2026 assembly election and believes this will make him a major force in state politics. He said he has already spoken to Owaisi about the plan, although neither Owaisi nor AIMIM has responded publicly.
Kabir also said he will try to stop the BJP’s rise in Bengal. The mosque issue has already sparked political tension ahead of next year’s election, raising fears of polarisation. He claimed that industries and Muslim organisations across India will support him and help fund the Babri project.
The Trinamool Congress suspended Kabir, saying the party stands for secular values. The BJP accused him of trying to create communal tensions by using the Babri name. Muslims are a key vote bank for Mamata Banerjee, and the Trinamool has long tried to stop the BJP from expanding in the state. Even though the BJP grew significantly in the 2021 elections, the Trinamool still won a large majority, though Mamata Banerjee herself lost in Nandigram.
Kabir said eight lakh people joined the foundation event for the proposed mosque on Saturday. He claimed that huge numbers of people from Murshidabad, Malda, North Dinajpur and South 24 Parganas brought bricks and cash as donations. The crowd caused long traffic jams on National Highway 12. Some attendees said the initiative reminded them of the demolition of the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya in 1992. Others said they viewed it as a protest against alleged mistreatment by the Trinamool government.
The BJP criticised Kabir strongly. State BJP chief Samik Bhattacharya said the mosque controversy was part of a plan by the Trinamool and that Kabir’s suspension was only for show. Former state BJP president and Union minister Sukanta Majumdar said a mosque named after Babur will never be accepted in Bengal. He said that while nobody opposes the construction of a mosque, naming it after Babur is an attempt to provoke Hindus and insult their sentiments.
