JOIN US“We have given a call for a 12-hour dawn-to-dusk general strike in the state on Friday to protest the murderous attack on the legislators, when they were on a visit to Mangolkot to provide relief to thousands of people rendered homeless following Communist Party of India (Marxist) terror and atrocities,” Congress legislature party leader Manas Bhunia told newsmen at the state assembly here.
The Trinamool Congress and the SUCI extended support to the strike as Bhunia on the floor of the state assembly and alleged that state industries minister Nirupam Sen was hatching a conspiracy to “kill” the Congress MLAs.
Eight legislators, besides Bhunia, ran for their lives through the slushy fields with armed Communist Party of India (Marxist) activists in hot pursuit.
Even though Bhunia and two other leaders managed to flee from the clutch of armed mob, the rest were caught up and badly thrashed allegedly by the Marxist supporters, with cops watching the episode as mute spectators.
Rabindranath Bhattacharya, Katwa Congress Member of Lelislative Assembly, who suffered several hits on the head, has been moved to a city hospital in a critical condition.
CM condemns attack
While Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacherjee condemned the attack and absolved Sen of all the charges, Congress activists across 13 districts in Bengal went berserk, torching nearly a dozen state government buses at various places and resorting to rail and road blocks at busy traffic intersections in the city as also districts.
The series of protests in South Bengal districts and the city since Thursday morning threw life completely out of gear as one Congress worker was killed and five injured following a pitched battle with the police in Mangolkot on Thursday.
The sudden road and rail blocks took people by surprise, plunging the busy thoroughfares into chaos.
Protests will continue across the state till the police officials who failed to take action and Communist Party of India (Marxist) cadres accused of launching the unprovoked attack are brought to book, Bhunia cautioned. While conceding the police failure in providing adequate security to the MLAs, Bhattacharjee said: “Such assault on MLAs never happened in the state and the role of police in it is being investigated.”
State home secretary Ashok M Chakraborty, who briefed the situation over phone to his counterpart in the union government, ruled out the possibility of any action against the police till the conclusion of the inquiry.
However, what has appalled the political observers in the state is the fact that despite advance information to the Burdwan district magistrate and the police superintendent about the visit of the Congress party delegation, security was not beefed up in Mangalkot, enabling the Communist Party of India (Marxist) cadres to go on the rampage.