Deflection Over Duty: The Mamata Banerjee Playbook of Victim Blaming
West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee has once again sparked outrage, though little surprise, following a recent horrific crime against a woman in the state. In the wake of a gang-rape incident involving a medical student in Durgapur, the chief minister, who also holds the portfolio for law and order, made a statement that shifted the focus from the perpetrators to the victim.
“Especially girl children at night time... they should not be allowed to come outside. They have to protect themselves also,” she commented, before pointing out, “How did she come out at 12.30 at night?”
Accountability has never been one of Banerjee’s virtues. Whether facing flood crises or massive scams, she invents a scapegoat to deflect blame. In the Durgapur rape case, the villains were the private college authority and the survivor who chose to be out at night. This deflection deliberately obscures her own failures to provide security to the female doctor at her workplace at R.G. Kar Medical College and Hospital, or to a student at the South Kolkata Law College, both state government-run institutions.
It is tragically consistent with her long-standing pattern of victim-shaming. This tradition dates back to the early years of her regime.
It began in 2012 with the Park Street gang-rape. When the survivor, Suzette Jordan, came forward, Banerjee infamously dismissed the crime as a “concocted story” (sajano ghotona). This provided an immediate institutional green light for victim-shaming.
Taking their cue from the chief minister's dismissal, Trinamool Congress deputy leader at Lok Sabha, Kakali Ghosh Dastidar, claimed the incident was merely a “sex deal gone wrong.” The female police officer, Damayanti Sen, who successfully secured arrests, was transferred to a low-profile posting shortly after, sending a clear message to the police force. In this regime, accountability is a professional risk.
The pattern of denial continued, often with glaring inaccuracies. Banerjee again termed a rape in Katwa “concocted”, baselessly implying the complaint was a political hit job by linking the victim's long-deceased husband to the then main opposition Communist Party of India- Marxist (CPI-M). In 2013, she shouted down women protesting the Kamduni rape and murder, accusing them of “doing CPM politics”. Years later, in 2022, she publicly questioned the gang-rape and death of a young teenager in Nadia’s Hanskhali, wondering if it was a case of “love affair” or “pregnancy” rather than a brutal assault.
Fostering a culture of impunity
This line of approach has brutal practical consequences. By questioning survivors’ character and movements, Banerjee effectively instructs the system to scrutinise the victim, not the crime. Her rhetoric, implying that an adult woman needs to be “allowed” to be out late, is the oldest, most tired trope in the patriarchy’s playbook.
Rather than taking responsibility, the chief minister's defense has consistently been one of cynical deflection. When confronted, she would resort to whataboutery, comparing her government’s failures to those in opposition-ruled states or her predecessor.
“Didi”, as she is known in the state, has built her political persona as the defiant daughter of Bengal, a shield against external political forces. Yet, when it comes to the most vulnerable within her own state, its women, this shield has not just been lowered but also often weaponised to vilify them. Her repeated, callous comments on crimes against women have fostered a culture of impunity. The state's rock-bottom conviction rates for crime against women are the predictable outcome.
The Durgapur case should have been a moment for moral clarity. It demanded three things – belief in the survivor, visible action on policing failures, and a firm insistence that the burden of scrutiny rests on the accused and the system – not on a woman’s clothes, company, or curfew.
Instead, Banerjee delivered only the familiar, sickening question: “Why was she out at night?”
Over three decades ago, Mamata Banerjee dramatically paraded Dipali Basak, a deaf-mute rape victim, at the Writers’ Buildings in 1992 to indict a rival regime. Years later, Dipali died in obscurity. Her mother said they were treated as political pawns, useful on the day of spectacle, disposable after.
Accountability isn’t complicated. But it requires integrity.
That use-and-throw template is the “Mamata Model” for women. Be a beneficiary of an incentive scheme, but not the one who implicates her governance. Be a face in the crowd, but not the voice that breaks the silence.
This article went live on October thirteenth, two thousand twenty five, at thirty-five minutes past one in the afternoon.The Wire is now on WhatsApp. Follow our channel for sharp analysis and opinions on the latest developments.
