Bengal
The Bengal Chamber of Commerce & Industry (BCC&I) organized a Financial Awareness Conclave – “Wealth: Inclusion, Creation, Protection & Growth” on Friday, bringing together policymakers, regulators, bankers, and financial experts.
The conclave featured a series of engaging expert roundtable discussions. The session on “Envisaging Integrated Financial Ecosystems: MSME Growth through Credit, Cash Flow & Capital”, witnessed insightful deliberations from Mr. Shams Tabrez, DGM-SME, State Bank of India, and Mr. Ujjwal Chandra, Deputy Zonal Head, Central Bank of India, on strengthening credit access and sustainable growth pathways for MSMEs
A big fight inside the Trinamool Congress (TMC) has now reached the bank. Former party treasurer Aroop Biswas has written to HDFC Bank, asking them to freeze the party’s accounts containing hundreds of crores, claiming there is a major dispute over who really controls the party.
Unearthing vital, suppressed records surrounding the legislative inception of the state, the Maulana Abul Kalam Azad Institute of Asian Studies (MAKAIAS) hosted a high-profile seminar titled “West Bengal: Revisiting its Past” on Saturday, June 20, 2026. Commemorating Paschimbanga Diwas—the historic day nearly eight decades ago when Bengal’s lawmakers voted to sever ties with the expanding map of East Pakistan—distinguished academics, researchers, and political leaders gathered to correct decades of distorted historical narratives. Delivering a compelling video address, West Bengal Assembly Speaker Rathindra Bose, a veteran chartered accountant, meticulously detailed how the state’s creation was explicitly designed to dismantle a deep-seated conspiracy aimed at dragging the entire landmass into a theocratic state. Bose positioned Dr. Syama Prasad Mookerjee as the singular, far-sighted leading light who unified ideologically polarized legislators in 1947 to secure a safe homeland for Hindu Bengalis. Echoing these structural concerns, MAKAIAS Director Dr. Sarup Prasad Ghosh slammed past administrations for intentionally imposing historical amnesia on refugees, while issuing an urgent, data-driven warning regarding a sharp drop in native Bengali speakers and an active “demographic invasion” fueled by systemic illegal immigration from Bangladesh.
In a major decision aimed at respecting religious traditions, the newly formed BJP government in West Bengal announced it will remove the word “Dham” from the newly constructed Jagannath Temple complex in the coastal town of Digha. The decision effectively resolves a year-long inter-state dispute regarding the shrine’s nomenclature.
In a historic development for India’s public health sector, West Bengal has officially signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to implement the Ayushman Bharat Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (AB PM-JAY).
The West Bengal administration has ordered the transfer of 179 police personnel across various districts and units in a major administrative reshuffle. The move is aimed at strengthening law and order, improving administrative efficiency, and ensuring impartial policing across the state.
Amid a catastrophic post-election split within the TMC, former Kolkata Mayor Firhad Hakim stunned political observers by holding a 70-minute closed-door meeting with rebel LoP Ritabrata Banerjee. While Hakim pleaded for party unity, the meeting highlights a rapidly dissolving command structure.
West Bengal has deported 4,800 undocumented immigrants to Bangladesh over the past month, with 836 more awaiting removal. Highlighting a strict “detect, delete, deport” policy, CM Suvendu Adhikari also announced a statewide household verification survey and expedited border fencing.
In a seismic shift for West Bengal’s entertainment industry, heavy-handed political control over Tollygunge’s studiopara cracked on Thursday night, June 4, 2026, as Kolkata Police arrested prominent Trinamool Congress leader Swarup Biswas. Once considered an untouchable sovereign over Tollywood’s studio floor logistics, the former president of the Federation of Cine Technicians & Workers of Eastern India (FCTWEI) was picked up by New Alipore police from his Sahapur Colony residence. His arrest follows an explicit FIR lodged by a 42-year-old local makeup artist who detailed a toxic corporate “syndicate raj.” The complainant alleged that after being blacklisted and denied work for two years, she was pressured by Biswas to pay cash bribes and make sexual compromises at the Suruchi Sangha club premises to secure employment. When she refused, she was met with violent death threats. Booked under rigorous provisions of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) for sexual harassment and extortion alongside the Arms Act, Biswas’s arrest sparked massive street celebrations outside the police station. Concurrently, investigators at Lalbazar are opening wider lines of inquiry connecting Swarup and his brother, former sports minister Aroop Biswas, to an alleged ₹22-lakh extortion and ticket black-marketing racket tied to Lionel Messi’s high-profile India tour event.
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