Waving a big Catla fish in his hands, Sharadwat Mukherjee went door to door canvassing for votes before Thursday\u2019s election to the state legislature in the eastern Indian state of West Bengal.<\/p>\n
Mukherjee is a candidate from Prime Minister Narendra Modi\u2019s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which rules nationally but has never come to power in the state, which has a greater population than Germany: more than 90 million people.<\/p>\n
When he folds his hands to greet voters, the Catla just swings with a hook in its mouth. The big question: Can the fish also swing the election\u2019s outcome?<\/p>\n
Bengalis\u2019 love for fish is legendary \u2014 on both sides of the border, in India and in Bangladesh. So much so that when a student-led uprising led to the ouster of then-Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, some of the protesters who broke into her residence after she fled were seen raiding her refrigerator and walking away with fish.<\/p>\n
But as West Bengal votes for its next government, fish has now leapt from kitchen slabs to the campaign trail, as leaders cosy up to voters in a variety of ways \u2014 and in some cases try to distance themselves from suspicions that their wins could hit the Bengali diet adversely.<\/p>\n Nearly 68 million people in West Bengal are expected to vote for their candidate of choice on April 23 and 29, to elect 294 lawmakers to the state assembly.<\/p>\n The results will be declared on May 4 in the crucial state vote, which the Hindu majoritarian BJP has never governed.<\/p>\n A revision of the electoral list, which controversially swept away a total of 9.1 million names from the register before polling, and has been criticised for disenfranchising minorities, was among the major polling issues. Some 2.7 million people have challenged their expulsions.<\/p>\n Another is identity politics.<\/p>\n On the campaign trail, in rallies, and in interviews, the chief minister of Bengal, Mamata Banerjee, a firebrand, centrist regional leader \u2014 who has been sometimes touted as a contender for Modi\u2019s job in New Delhi, if the opposition were to win \u2014 has doubled down on identity politics to corner the BJP, analysts say.<\/p>\n BJP-led governments in several states have imposed bans or restrictions on the sale of meat. Far-right mobs have carried out lynchings of Muslims in BJP-ruled states over accusations that they were transporting beef.<\/p>\n Banerjee, who is seeking a fourth consecutive term, has time and again warned that if the BJP were to come to power, they would \u201cban fish, meat, and even eggs\u201d \u2014 effectively labelling them as outsiders, unaware of Bengali culture. The BJP has rejected these allegations.<\/p>\n Biswanath Chakraborty, a psephologist and political analyst in West Bengal who has authored several books on voting behaviour, told Al Jazeera that the whole issue surrounding fish had been \u201cconstructed by Mamata Banerjee.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cFor long, she has peddled that fish is parallel to Bengali politics,\u201d he said. \u201cIn election campaigning, every issue is constructed, and Mamata is the champion of that.\u201d<\/p>\n Chakraborty argued that by fiercely pushing back against these allegations, the BJP had ended up helping the governing party in Bengal make sure the debate over fish remained a campaign highlight with voters.<\/p>\n \u201cThey [the BJP] are entering, or rather trapped, into the discourse set by Mamata,\u201d the analyst said.<\/p>\n \u201cFish is very crucial in Bengal, very crucial,\u201d said Utsa Ray, an assistant professor at Jadavpur University, in West Bengal\u2019s capital Kolkata. She also authored a 2015 book on Bengal\u2019s culinary evolution in colonial India, titled Culinary Culture in Colonial India: A Cosmopolitan Platter and the Middle-Class.<\/p>\n \u201cFirst of all, due to Bengal\u2019s geographical location itself \u2013 along the Bay of Bengal \u2013 [and as] a place situated near rivers and streams, fish have been the most available item,\u201d she told Al Jazeera.<\/p>\n Fish has also been an integral part of many rituals in Bengal on auspicious days for both Hindus and Muslims, Ray said, adding, however, that there were sects of people in Bengal who refrain from eating fish.<\/p>\n![\"Bengal](\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/AFP__20260317__A3LM7T9__v1__MidRes__IndiaPoliticsElection-1776851964.jpg?w=770&resize=770%2C513&quality=80\")
What\u2019s happening in the West Bengal election?<\/h2>\n
![\"Fish](\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/2011-11-12T120000Z_253542743_GM1E7BC1TJI01_RTRMADP_3_BANGLADESH-1776851823.jpg?w=770&resize=770%2C451&quality=80\")
Why fish, though?<\/h2>\n
![\"Fish](\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/AFP__20240924__36G687K__v2__MidRes__TopshotIndiaBangladeshDiplomacyFish-1776851840.jpg?w=770&resize=770%2C513&quality=80\")