Former West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has alleged that India’s Home Minister Amit Shah personally requested her to suppress news of arrests related to the killing of Bangladeshi activist Sharif Osman Bin Hadi. Speaking at a sit-in protest in Kolkata’s Dharmatala on Tuesday, Banerjee claimed that West Bengal’s Special Task Force (STF) had detained the main suspects after they crossed into India through Meghalaya. She said Shah phoned her, citing national interest, and asked that the matter not be made public.

Hadi, a 32-year-old political activist and spokesperson of Bangladesh’s Inquilab Manch, was shot dead in Dhaka in December 2025. The Dhaka Metropolitan Police’s Detective Branch identified Faisal Karim Masud and Alamgir Hossain as the main shooters, who later fled to India. In March 2026, West Bengal’s STF arrested them in Bongaon, North 24 Parganas, along with an accomplice accused of aiding their border crossing.

Banerjee’s remarks have sparked sharp political debate, reframing Hadi’s killing as a potential cross-border conspiracy with geopolitical implications between India and Bangladesh.