While the BJP on Saturday attacked Bengal’s ruling Trinamool Congress for allowing unchecked infiltration in the interests of its vote bank politics, sources in the CID which was currently investigating the high-profile Ranaghat gang-rape case said rape was not prime on their agenda and that the Bangladeshi criminals who perpetrated the crime did so as a “retaliatory measure against the resistance they faced from the school staff while committing dacoity for which they had come.”
The CID now investigating the case has come to know after intensely grilling the two accused, Salim Sheikh and Gopal Sarkar, who were earlier arrested from Mumbai and Habra respectively. The CID which got the two criminals to sit face to face has also learnt that Sarkar, a resident of Habra who was earlier believed to have only hosted the trans-border criminals, was in fact the main mastermind of the crime often inviting Bangladeshi gangsters to India, employing them in crimes like robbery and sending them back across the border after appropriating the lion’s share of the booty.
An elderly nun of a Christian missionary school was gang-raped by a gang of Bangladeshi criminals who had broken into the school in the night intervening March 14 and 15. “Already three such cases of dacoity have been reported against his name,” an official said, adding Sarkar’s wife had identified all the eight accused from their photographs. They had assembled at Sarkar’s house a couple of days before the crime and had even been taken by him to Ranaghat for a pre-operation recce of the spot.
The two criminals would be taken to Rangahat for on-the-spot recreation of the entire incident, CID sources said, adding efforts would soon be taken to take the help of the Bangladesh Government to trace all the accused, some of them had been identified as Habib, Manik, Babu, Sadiq and Pintu have sneaked back to Bangladesh. The gang-rape and dacoity had taken place on March 14 hitting national headlines.
Attacking the Trinamool Congress for allowing unhindered infiltration “in the interest of their vote bank politics because no genuine voter in India will vote for them” BJP’s national observer for Bengal Siddharth Nath Singh said Bangladeshi infiltration was the common thread between Khagragarh blast, and trans-border crimes such as the Ranaghat gang-rape case.
He added, “Ranaghat case vindicates our stand on Bangladeshi infiltration. The horrific incident proves what kind of lawlessness that this Bangladeshi infiltration has created,” saying the intruders also take their toll on the country’s economy.