West Bengal Post-Poll Violence: After NHRC Report, Two More Arrested In BJP Leader's Murder Case

The Kolkata Police on Saturday arrested two more men in connection with the murder of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) worker Abhijit Sarkar in post-poll violence on 2 May, reports Hindustan Times.

“A total of seven out of eight people named in the FIR have now been arrested,” an officer from the detective department was quoted in the report. “The two accused, identified as brothers Sanjay Dey alias Subho (26) and Avijit Dey alias Laltoo (25) who are residents of Narkeldanga, were arrested at their relative’s house in Chandannagar in Hooghly district,” said joint CP (crime) Murlidhar Sharma.

The arrests were made two days after the Calcutta high court’s five-judge bench headed by acting chief justice Rajesh Bindal said that the West Bengal government had failed to properly investigate complaints of post-poll violence.

“The proceedings have become adversarial because the state has failed to properly investigate,” the bench said on 22 July.

Earlier a seven-member team of the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) set up by the Calcutta High Court to probe post-poll violence in Bengal had come out with a scathing indictment of the Mamata Banerjee government in the state.

The NHRC team observed that the ‘law of the ruler’ exists in Bengal instead of the ‘rule of the law’. It recommended that the CBI be asked to prove heinous offences like rape, sexual molestation and murder, and that the trial of the cases being probed by the CBI be held outside the state.

The NHRC team, in its 50-page report, had stated that at least 1,934 police complaints (of political violemce) were lodged in the state between May 2 and June 20, including 29 complaints of murder, 12 of rape and sexual assault and 940 of loot and arson. Out of the 9,304 people named as accused, less than 3% are currently in jail.