HC reprimands WB Police in Mamata cartoon case

In a major embarrassment for the Mamata Banerjee Government, the Calcutta High Court on Thursday reprimanded the State police for arresting Jadavpur University professor Ambikesh Mahapatra for disseminating on the internet a caricature of Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, and then Railway Minister Dinesh Trivedi and his successor Mukul Roy

The court also called for the files regarding a State Human Rights Commission order awarding `50,000 compensation for Mahapatra. The State had, however, chosen to ignore the Commission order.Subsequently the professor filed a writ in the High Court following which Justice Dipankar Dutta upheld the WBHRC order and directed the Government to pay the compensation.

On Thursday the court questioned the over-enthusiasm of the police in making arrests in bailabe offences. The State’s argument that arrest was preventive in nature was thrown out by the court which severely “reprimanded the police,” lawyers said.“This is a victory of human rights and a proof of the fact how human rights is trampled upon in Bengal,” Bengali actor Kaushik Sen said. Activist Bolan Ganguli said, “the High Court order should make the police conscious of the fact that they are paid from tax payers’ money not to serve the politicians but to uphold law and protect the people.”

The incident had taken place in 2012 soon after Mamata removed Trivedi and nominated Mukul Roy in his place as the Railway Minister following some differences regarding the Railway Budget. Soon a cartoon appeared on the Net comparing the trio with characters of a famous Satyajit Ray detective classic Sonar Kella.

However, Mamata Banerjee, the then CM, saw in it a ploy to assassinate her and the police soon swung into action and in a midnight operation arrested Mahapatra and an engineer friend who had only forwarded the caricature to some friends. Furthermore the duo was held up in the police lockup though a bailable section was slapped against them.