Protests against the ill-treatment and exploitation of women of Sandeshkhali by Trinamool Congress leaders continued to roil West Bengal as the BJP, the Congress and the CPIM pulled out all stops to build up the momentum against the Mamata Banerjee Government. A two-member team from the National Commission for Women (NCW) rushed to Sandeshkhali to meet the women victims.
In a late-night development yesterday, Governor CV Ananda Bose went straight to the airport after visiting Sandeshkhali and meeting the women who prostrated themselves and sought his help. He took a late-night flight to New Delhi for urgent consultation. He even refused to spend the night at the State Government’s Bangla Bhavan and stayed at a Central Government guest-house.
Kolkata High Court, in the meanwhile, quashed the prohibitory orders that the West Bengal Police had promulgated under Section 144 to keep Opposition leaders away from Sandeshkhali. In another development, another bench of the High Court took suo motu notice of the Sandeshkhali incident and appointed a well-known criminal lawyer as amicus curiae.
The Single Judge Bench of Justice Joy Sengupta quashed the Sec 144 notice issued by the police.
“The due process has not been followed. The police have not substantiated the grounds for promulgating such an order. It stands quashed,” the court pronounced.
The BJP’s Leader of the Opposition Suvendu Adhikari had approached the High Court after the Kolkata Police prevented 60-odd MLAs of the BJP from going towards Sandeshkhali yesterday.
They were stopped by Kolkata Police in Kolkata based on the request by the Superintendent of Police of the Basirhat range under which Sandeshkhali falls.
Another Single Judge of Calcutta High Court, Justice Apurba Sinha Roy, took suo motu notice of the Sandeshkhali incident and appointed a well-known criminal lawyer as amicus curiae to assist it.
Justice Apurba Sinha Roy took suo motu cognisance of allegations of sexual assault on women “at gunpoint” and transfer of tribal land at Sandeshkhali and directed the Registrar-General of the High Court to issue notice to the State, senior police and administrative officials in this regard.
Justice Sinha Roy appointed advocate Jayanta Narayan Chatterjee as the amicus curiae to assist the high court in the matter.
The judge said he was pained and “very disturbed” over media reports on alleged sexual harassment of women at Sandeshkhali, and taking away of tribal land in violation of legal formalities and laws even as Public Prosecutor Debasish Roy, representing the State, tried in vain to appeal against it. The judge brushed aside his contention that the State Government “was taking all necessary steps to probe all allegations against everybody who had broken the law”
The matter will come up for hearing on February 20.
A two-member team of the National Commission of Women today met the women protesters of Sandeshkhali and recorded their statements. “My colleague Delina Khongdup and I went to meet the women of Sandeshkhali. They are in a lot of fear and told us about their apprehensions. They told us that tribal women of Sandeshkhali had been sexually exploited by the Trinamool Congress leaders. We shall be submitting our report to the NSW chairperson by tomorrow for further action,” Shalini Singh of the NCW told The Daily Guardian.
Meanwhile, State BJP chief Sukanta Majumdar led a procession of partymen to gherao the SP’s office at Basirhat but the police burst teargas shells as the mob pelted stones. “Many of our karyakartas have been attacked and injured by Mamata’s police. Even women karyakartas have not been spared,” Majumdar told reporters as he sat on dharna in Basirhat.
A group of Congress workers were stopped by the police at Rampur, 30 km from Kolkata, from proceeding towards Dhamakhali from which ferry services operate to Sandeshkhali.
The CPIM continued its programme of holding protests in all district headquarters across the State against the atrocities on the women of Sandeshkhali. “All of Bengal must fight this heinous crime against women. It is a matter of great shame that we have a woman Chief Minister who is only interested in corruption, money and nothing else,” CPIM politburo member Md. Salim told The Daily Guardian.
A large number of women in Sandeshkhali have been protesting and accusing the Trinamool Congress’ local strongman Shajahan Sheikh and his supporters of sexually assaulting them on a regular basis for the past 12 years.
The local women – most of whom belong to Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe communities – have been holding demonstrations since last week against panchayat zilla parishad members Shiba Prasad Hazra and Uttam Sardar who are key Trinamool leaders in the region. Sheikh has been absconding since last month after a team of the Enforcement Directorate that went to raid his house in connection with an alleged ration scam was beaten up by a mob of his supporters.