After Saturday's “fake video”, on Thursday, emerged the 'fake FIR' in the Sandeshkhali mass rape case, threatening to dent and disturb the BJP's soaring graph in the Basirhat parliamentary constituency.
Things tended to boomerang against the saffron outfit, even as the Trinamool Congress' sting teams worked overtime to turn the Sandeshkhali rape-and-land-grab cases upside down.
Some women on Thursday said the police complaint that they were made to sign on blank sheets were not about rape but about non-payment of hundred days' work schemes.
"We were tricked into signing the blank papers … we were told that the signed papers would be used to claim the 100-days' work dues … we had no idea that rape stories would be written there. We discovered later that rape complaints had been lodged in our names. This is a blatant lie," they said.
The woman said the incident took place on the day the National Commission for Women visited the island. "A woman called Piyali who is an outsider did it all … we told them that we had not received money as part of the 100 days' job scheme. But in the name of getting us to write a complaint to that effect she made us sign on a blank sheet," she said.
The BJP immediately rose up to control damage by saying the TMC is threatening the women to change their versions.
"Earlier they showed a fake and paid video and now they are coming up with this … The leadership will have to say what has to be said but it is clear that it is the same TMC which has been threatening the villagers into submission for the past 10 years once again have started doing so … though I haven’t seen it … if the video is true then the women are being threatened to contradict their statements," a local BJP leader at Basirhat said on conditions of anonymity.
State BJP leader Priyanka Tibrewal asked, "What the TMC was doing for the past several months … why they have suddenly brought this fake video and fake FIR issue … this is an afterthought … but the damage has already been done … earlier they said the women were lying and now they are saying they were tricked to lie."
Another BJP leader said, "The TMC can do everything … a party that can steal jobs can steal and fake anything."
The scandalous developments at Sandeshkhali --- allegedly involving some of its local leaders like Sheikh Shahjahan who were presently in jail --- had immensely injured the image of TMC and the Mamata Banerjee Government in the run up to the parliamentary elections.
Incidentally the Thursday's video emerged days after a similar sting video coming up on Saturday sparking controversy. In the earlier purported video an individual identified as Gangadhar Koyal a reported booth-level saffron leader was heard telling that some women of Sandeshkhali who were not victims of sexual assault had misrepresented her case under the direction of a top Opposition leader.
TMC general secretary Abhisek Banerjee went to town with the video clippings claiming how the BJP had used its ill-gotten money in its disinformation campaign by dishonouring the women of Sandeshkhali to earn political mileage before the elections.
The TMC on Thursday approached the Election Commission of India seeking police action against the State BJP leadership, including Opposition leader Suvendu Adhikari, saying how the purported videos showed that that the BJP's own functionaries were claiming that the sexual assault stories were all concocted.
"We have written a letter to the EC. We've told them how the Sandeshkhali incident was a conspiracy hatched by the BJP so that false rape statements are given. There were no rapes in Sandeshkhali, it is all a lie." TMC MP Sagarika Ghosh said.
In Kolkata Bengal Minister Shashi Panja playing a video where a top BJP leader was heard using abusive words against women said "the entire Sandeshkhali episode is a sham … things were hatched for votes … those who have money used them to malign TMC and Bengal".
