JOIN US With the Election Commission (EC) not taking lightly the manhandling of its personnel by Trinamool Congress (TMC) activists, the state government arrested four people, including the son-in-law of minister Savitri Mitra, for the assault on Friday.
The Election Commission on Friday directed the West Bengal Police chief to arrest all persons named in an FIR for beating up poll personnel in the state.
The Malda district administration had lodged two FIRs at the Manikchak police station on Thursday after being directed by the EC to take immediate action. Following the FIR, the police arrested Motiur Rehman and Muklesur Rehman from Malda’s Rathbari area, besides nabbing Jamal Khan and Mitra’s son-in-law Samadip Sarkar from Rabindra Avenue, Malda SP Rupesh Kumar said.
All four were produced before the chief judicial magistrate’s court on Friday which remanded them to two days police custody, he added.
The state government, which has been sharing a strained rapport with the EC ever since it ordered the transfer of seven senior police and administrative officials, was forced to take action.
According to sources, though the four accused were not initially arrested, things changed later in the day. The police had claimed on Thursday it had no information about any assault on poll officials.
Not willing to be rapped by the poll panel once more for not taking proper action, the state government arrested seven people who could be identified in the video footage.
The police swung into action after the order came directly from the Director General of Police (DGP) G M P Rajashekhar Reddy, who has been instructed to make necessary arrests and submit a compliance report by 5 pm on Friday.
After the incident, top officials in the Commission met and decided to seek a report from the DGP.