Bengal’s Sandeshkhali violence: Tension again as women hit streets

Kolkata, Feb 1: Even as Section 144 imposed and patrolling by a huge police contingent continues in the area, tension broke out at violence-hit Sandeshkhali in North 24 Parganas district of West Bengal on Saturday again.
Tension started brewing after a 25-member delegation of BJP tried to enter Sandeshkhali on Saturday evening and was stopped by the police deployed there. Following that there was heated exchange of words between the BJP delegation members and the police officers in-charge of the deployment.
BJP leader Krishnendu Mukhopadhyay said that they pleaded for allowing just four members of the delegation to enter Sandeshkhali and submit a deputation at the local police station there. “However, the police did not even allow us that. Actually, they are scared that if we enter, information will further surface on how the police are working hand-in-glove with the local Trinamool Congress goons to suppress the democratic movement by the local people there,” he said.
As this tension was building up just outside the territory of Sandeshkhali, another tension broke out as a group of women assembled on the streets carrying bamboo sticks and sickles protesting attack at the residence of a local villager late Friday night by a group of ruling party-backed hooligans.
The women marched to Sandeshkhali Police Station and started protesting outside it. They alleged that the local hooligans were assisted by the local cops in organising the attack on the residence of the local villager.
On Thursday, the local people, mainly by women, seeking absconding Trinamool Congress leader Sheikh Shahjahan’s arrest, burnt down a poultry farm owned by his close confidant and Trinamool Congress leader Shibu Hazra.
Section 144 has already been imposed in part of Sandeshkhali in view of the growing tension in the area. Ban on the use of the Internet has also been imposed there for an indefinite period. (IANS)