KOLKATA: A migrant worker from Katwa’s Karjgram, Tarzan Sheikh, alleged on Friday that he was assaulted by a mob in Odisha last Sunday for being a “Bengali-speaking Bangladeshi”. Sheikh, undergoing treatment for a fractured arm, has lodged a complaint with Katwa police.Sheikh said he has been working as a hawker in Jaleshwar for over five years, selling household steel utensils in a bicycle. He stayed in the Rajpur area.Skeikh claimed the assault took place near Lakshmandihi area. He was asked in Odia about his whereabouts. When Sheikh replied in Bengali, showing his Aadhaar and EPIC to identify himself, he was badly thrashed. The mob branded his documents “forged” and assaulted him for being a Bangladeshi, he said. They also stole Rs 6,000 from his possession.Sheikh, somehow, managed to escape his tormentors and rushed back home. A day later, he returned to Katwa.Highlighting Sheikh’s statements, Trinamool alleged: “How long will the nation endure the authoritarian BJP’s politics of hate and division? In Odisha, a young street vendor was brutally assaulted in broad daylight. For simply speaking in Bengali. BJP-backed thugs branded him a ‘Bangladeshi’, fractured his hand, looted his earnings and stripped him of his dignity.”“This is the true face of BJP’s bigotry, where languages are insulted, cultures vilified and identities crushed under the weight of hatred,” the party added.