Sukanta Majumdar, BJP member of Parliament from Balurghat and president of the Bengal unit of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) sustained injuries and was hospitalised after falling from a car bonnet while leading a protest against the alleged atrocities on women of Sandeshkhali by Trinamool Congress leaders. While the BJP spokespersons at both the State and Central levels condemned the incident and the police’s overzealousness, the Trinamool Congress dismissed it as “a stunt and excellent acting” by the State BJP chief.
Majumdar was leading a protest at Taki from where he was supposed to go to Sandeshkhali, 50 km away. A huge police contingent, equipped with riot gear, massed round the guesthouse where he had lodged for the night and refused to let him leave.
Majumdar was forced to sneak out by the side gate. Policewomen were at the forefront in trying to prevent the BJP chief from proceeding when he climbed up on a SUV’s bonnet in order to extricate himself. Majumdar lost balance and fell on the car’s bonnet, hurting the back of his head. He was taken to the Basirhat multi-speciality hospital where he was put on oxygen support and from there he was rushed to a private hospital in Kolkata.
The BJP’s State secretary Jagannath Chattopadhyay told The Daily Guardian: “Mamata Banerjee is trying to implicate BJP leaders by foisting molestation cases against them. That is why policewomen are being asked to get close to our leaders during protests. They tried it earlier with the Leader of the Opposition Suvendu Adhikari. Today they tried the same trick on Sukanta da. He was forced to climb up on the car bonnet in order to ensure that this plan did not succeed. Even then, a policewoman also got up on the bonnet and tried to grab him.”
The unrest stemmed from the ongoing agitation by women in Sandeshkhali, who have accused Trinamool Congress leader Shajahan Sheikh and his associates of perpetrating atrocities against them.
On Tuesday, Majumdar was prevented from going to Sandeshkhali by the district administration and was put up at a guest house in Taki late in the night following a dharna in front of the Basirhat police district SP’s office.
“After yesterday’s protests, I decided to stay at a lodge in Taki so that I could easily visit Sandeshkhali from here. But since this morning, police have blocked the entrance of the lodge and are not allowing me to move out,” Majumdar said in the afternoon before the fracas. Majumdar claimed he was put under “house arrest” – a claim denied by the police.
Local women in Sandeshkhali have been demanding the arrest of absconding Trinamool Congress leader Sheikh Shahjahan, who has been on the run since the January 5 attack on Enforcement Directorate (ED) officials. They were attacked during a raid at Shahjahan’s residence in connection with an alleged public distribution system (PDS) scam.
The women claim that Sheikh and his “gang” have been sexually harassing women in the area for years and have captured swathes of cultivable land by force.
After the Calcutta High Court yesterday quashed the prohibitory orders imposed on the whole of Sandeshkhali, the police reimposed Section 144 CrPC in and around 500 metres of the areas in seven gram panchayats, including Sandeshkhali gram panchayat till February 18 midnight.
The police also pasted the Section 144 CrPC order on the walls in Sandeshkhali which said that prohibitory orders would be valid in and around 500 metres of the following areas from 23.45 hrs (February 13) to 00.00 hrs on February 19.
The prohibitory orders were imposed on all boat ghats like Khulna Ghat, Bholakhali Ghat, Sandeshkhali Ghat that have ferry services connecting the mainland to Sandeshkhali.
Dismissing the BJP’s claims, the Trinamool Congress said Majumdar was “staging a drama”. Trinamool Congress spokesman and Rajya Sabha MP Santanu Sen said: “Maybe he (Majumdar) has understood that his tenure as an MP will soon come to an end and thus, he wants to turn to show business. He wants to become an actor and it is evident from today’s stunt.”
Trinamool Congress chief spokesperson Kunal Ghosh said: “This is nothing but a stunt by the BJP since they know they have failed as a party. Sukanta Majumdar is looking for photo-ops so that he can send the photos and videos to his party bosses in Delhi so that he can later tell them how hard he is working.”