Probe team alleges ‘State-sponsored’ violence in Bengal, seeks Central intervention
A team of BJP leaders that visited West Bengal’s Birbhum district after a party worker’s death has alleged Trinamool Congress workers were behind his killing and asked the Union Home Ministry to immediately seek a report from the State Government and refer the case to National Human Rights Commission.
The ‘study group’, headed by party vice-president Balbir Punj, in its report presented to BJP president Amit Shah on Tuesday alleged minorities in the State were living under constant fear and insecurity.
The BJP team alleged that Chief Minister Mamta Banerjee was feeling “insecure” after the lok Sabha results saw BJP’s vote percentage in the State increasing from six per cent to 17 per cent.
The BJP has also won two lok Sabha seats in West Bengal —Ahluwalia from Darjeeling and Supriyo in Asansol.
The BJP group said the Union Home Ministry should take cognisance of such violent incidents and direct the State Government in taking immediate action and seek a report.
The BJP delegation met Shah at the BJP headquarters and presented its report on the death of party worker Sheikh Rahim on June 7 in Kanoor village in Ilam Bazaar of Birbhum district in West Bengal.
The group asked the party to seek the intervention of the National Minorities Commission in the matter and asked the party’s human rights cell to keep an eye on such incidents and ensure reaching out to the affected persons and help grant adequate relief to them by involving the Human Rights Commission.
The delegation, comprising of Kirti Azad, Siddharth Nath Singh, Rahul Sinha and Abdul Rashid Ansari, was deputed by former party chief and Home Minister Rajnath Singh on June 12 to give an on-the-spot report on the killing of the BJP worker.
Talking to The Pioneer, Azad said the law and order situation is “serious” in West Bengal and needs to be reviewed. Asked whether it could be compared with Uttar Pradesh, the BJP MP said, “both States are competing with each other”.
The report stated that the people of West Bengal had voted for Trinamool in the hope of a change in the state by ending the 34-year-old rule of the left and alleged that
CPI-M goons have joined Trinamool Congress ranks.
“Pashchim Bengal main, 34 saal baad marxwadiyo ko hara kar parivartan ke naam per TMC ayi, lekin Pachim Bengal ko parivartan nahin mila.Kyoki maxwadiyon ke peshewar goondaon ne TMC ka chola pahan liya” (Defeating Maxists after 34 years TMC came to power in the name of ‘change’ but the State did not experience any such change as professional Marxist `goondas`are now dressing themselves as TMC members), the report said.
The report alleges Trinamool Congress goons are attacking BJP workers and looting their homes with the active support of the police and the Government after the surge in BJP vote share.This is the second delegation of party leaders to visit West Bengal in the wake of repeated incidents of attacks on BJP workers and supporters in that State.
The BJP president had earlier sent a five-member team comprising party vice-presidents and MPs— Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi and SS Ahluwalia, along with national spokesperson and MP Meenakshi lekhi, besides its Asansol MP Babul Suprio and Sidhharth Nath Singh to assess the ground situation there.
Describing as “precarious” the law and order situation in West Bengal, the earlier BJP team had in its report to Rajnath Singh on the ground situation in the state demanded urgent measures to rectify it.
The five-member team alleged that the violence could be “State-sponsored” and that the border area with Bangladesh is the “new home for Islamic fundamentalist groups being patronised” by the Trinamool Congress (TMC) government for vote bank politics.
The ruling Trinamool Congress has refuted these charges and accused the BJP of fomenting violence.