Bengal woman teacher tied up, dragged and locked inside house

Balurghat, February 3

A woman was tied up, dragged on the road and locked inside a house by alleged Trinamool Congress (TMC) supporters who wanted to “forcibly” acquire her land for a village road in West Bengal’s South Dinajpur district.

The incident has kicked up a storm, with opposition parties accusing the TMC of “letting loose goondaraj” in the state.

The TMC leadership dubbed the allegations as “baseless” and said they would look into it.

The woman identified as high school teacher and BJP supporter Smritikana Das, her mother and other family members were also assaulted by the group, led by panchayat members, at Nandanpur in Gangarampur block, the police said.

So far nobody has been arrested in connection with the incident that took place on Friday.

A video grab of the purported attack showed Nandanpur panchayat ‘upa-pradhan’ (deputy chief) Amal Sarkar and some others involved in the act, the police said.

The TMC district leadership on Sunday expelled Sarkar for his alleged involvement in the incident, party sources said.

The video showed that the teacher fell down on the road when the attackers tied her hands and legs, and dragged her for nearly 30ft while raining blows on her.

The attackers then locked her up inside a house, belonging to a TMC block level worker.

Her sister, Soma, was also beaten up by the attackers when she went to Smritikana’s rescue.

The teacher, who was discharged from a local hospital after preliminary treatment, lodged a complaint against Sarkar and four TMC supporters at Gangarampur police station, a police officer said.

“We are probing the incident and also talking to eyewitnesses,” he said.

According to locals, the panchayat had recently taken up a project to build a road that would pass by the woman’s land.

BJP state general secretary Sayantan Basu said, “These incidents are just a reflection of the goondaraj that has been going on in the state. The TMC has institutionalised hooliganism in the state. Just because the person was a lady teacher, such kind of torture was meted out to her.”

CPI(M) leader Sujan Chakraborty too echoed his views.

TMC secretary general Partha Chatterjee said that action has been taken against the accused and iterated that the party never supports such action.

Several civil society groups are planning to move human rights commission against the incident.

Calcutta HC asks state legal aid authority to file report at the earliest

Meanwhile, the Calcutta High Court directed the West Bengal Legal Aid Service Authority to file a report in connection with the alleged physical assault of a woman in South Dinajpur district.

On a prayer for taking suo motu cognisance of the issue by a lawyer, a Division Bench led by Chief Justice TBN Radhakrishnan directed the member secretary of the state Legal Aid Authority to submit the report at the earliest, after obtaining relevant information.

Nobody has been arrested in the case so far.

Advocate Rabishankar Chatterjee drew attention of the court to the incident, citing newspaper reports.

The Division Bench, however, said that cognisance of a matter cannot be taken solely on the basis of media reports and sought a detailed account of the incident from the legal aid service authority. — PTI