Bengal BJP leaders on Friday wrote to Home Minister Amit Shah to demand a National Investigative Agency probe into the attack on a team of Enforcement Directorate officers and their CRPF escorts who had gone to raid a Trinamool Congress leader’s house in connection with a multi-crore ration distribution scam.
The leaders alleged that Rohingyas, who have illegally entered the country, were among the mob of more than 1,500 people who beat up a team of ED officials and their 30-man CRPF escort group when the team attempted to raid the house of Shahjahan Shiekh, a Trinamool Congress leader, in Sandeshkhali in North 24-Parganas district, early on Friday.
An ED assistant director and three other officers were grievously injured and admitted to hospital. As Sheikh’s supporters attacked the officials and their cars with bricks and bamboo sticks, the raid on the Trinamool Congress leader could not be conducted. Sections of the mob raised slogans in favour of Shahjahan Shiekh before the events turned violent.
Shahjahan Shiekh is considered to be a close aide of State Minister Jyotipriya Mallick who was arrested in connection with the multi-crore ration distribution scam.
“This kind of attack is unprecedented. We have sent a report on Shiekh Shahjahan to our Delhi office,” the ED officer told The Daily Guardian.
State President Sukanta Majumdar shot off a letter to Amit Shah while Leader of the Opposition, Suvendu Adhikari, spoke to the Home Minister to demand an NIA investigation.
Sukanta Majumdar said: “There are complaints and corruption charges against all Trinamool leaders. It is natural that ED will take action. It is quite obvious. The attack on ED in West Bengal’s Sandeshkhali shows what the Rohingya are doing to the law and order in the State.”
West Bengal Governor CV Ananda Bose summoned the Home Secretary and the Director-General of Police to Raj Bhavan. In a statement, he said: “It is a ghastly incident. It is alarming and deplorable. It is the duty of a civilised Government to stop barbarism and vandalism in a democracy. If a Government fails in its basic duty, then the Constitution of India will take its course. I reserve all my constitutional options for appropriate action. This pre-election violence should find an early end, and this is the beginning of that end.”
Trinamool Congress spokesperson and Minister Shashi Panja said: “This is what happens when the Central Government uses its agencies like the ED and CBI to malign the State and harass and provoke common people.”
Suvendu Adhikari blamed Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee for the attack on the ED officials and CRPF jawans. He accused her of trying to instigate her party workers. “I laud the courageous CRPF jawans who have shown immense maturity and remained calm under such tremendous pressure by not shooting at the mob, even risking their lives by doing so.
The brave jawans foiled @MamataOfficial’s cunning plan of creating a situation which would end up looking like Sitalkuchi, had they fired even once. If one person from the mob had died today, Mamata Banerjee and her whole party leadership would have succeeded in diverting the attention from the limitless corruption and the investigation to nab the culprits,” Suvendu Adhikari wrote on X. ED sources said that the agency on Friday conducted raids at 15 places in the State and Shahjahan Sheikh’s house was one of them.
They said that a mob of about 2,000 people, including a large number of women, first gheraoed the ED officials and the central forces personnel who accompanied them when they tried to break the locks of Sheikh’s residence in Sandeshkhali area and demonstrated before assaulting them and forcing them to leave the area, the officer said. The cars of the entire team and those of accompanying television channels were damaged.
Congress, the Trinamool Congress’s I.N.D.I.A. alliance partner, also condemned the attack on the ED and CRPF team. Pradesh Congress chief Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury said: “After the attack by goons of the ruling Government on ED officials, it is clear that there is no law and order in the State. Today, they were injured, tomorrow they can be murdered. Such a thing would not come as a surprise to me.
However, Trinamool Congress MP Santanu Sen alleged that the officials of the federal agency “provoked” the locals which led to a counter-reaction from the people.
“The officers of the Central investigation agency surrounded by the Central forces provoked the local people. That’s why there were counter reactions continuously,” he said.
Santanu Sen also said that the people of the country are “frustrated” with actions taken by the Central agencies which are being “monitored from Delhi”.
“The real fact is the people of India are frustrated watching this deep-rooted conspiracy engineered and monitored from Delhi daily and that too in the case of the TMC in West Bengal,” Sen added.