Kolkata: Bengal's capital city and its adjoining areas turned into a battlefield after the police and BJP leaders and supporters clashed during the saffron camp’s Nabanna Abhiyaan on Tuesday.
It may be noted that this was BJP’s first massive rally after the poll debacle in last year’s Assembly election. Thousands of party supporters from across the state assembled in Kolkata and its adjoining areas in Howrah Maidan and Satragachi from where the rally was supposed to start.
BJP national vice president Dilip Ghosh led the rally from central Kolkata and was stopped near Howrah Bridge.
The Leader of Opposition Suvendu Adhikari, who was supposed to lead the rally from Satragachi was arrested even before the rally started. Adhikari was seen engaging in a war of words with the police following which he along with BJP MP Locket Chatterjee was arrested.
BJP state president Sukanta Majumdar who led the rally from Howrah Maidan was also arrested along with other party workers while they were trying to break the police barricade. While the BJP supporters tried to break the barricade the police resorted to water cannons and tear gas to disperse the crowd.
The BJP supporters on the other side hurled stones at police and police had to lathi charge to disperse the crowd injuring both BJP leaders and police.
Terming the Chief Minister as ‘lady North Korea’, LoP Suvendu Adhikari alleged that Mamata is the kingpin of all the alleged corruption in the state.
“Mamata Police is on a war footing, trying to crush a democratic political event. The barricade of steel raised at Santragachi symbolizes her anxiety & timidity. Remember this @MamataOfficial, no wall can stand up to the ‘wave of democracy’, it would be breached sooner than later,” tweeted Adhikari.
While the BJP leaders were detained at police headquarters in Lalbazar, BJP supporters were seen setting a police van ablaze.
BJP national vice president Dilip Ghosh said that BJP has started ‘big’ rallies against the state government and also that in future the saffron camp will continue with their agitation.
According to BJP spokesperson, Shamik Bhattacharya several party workers are severely injured and out of which three of them are critically injured.
TMC state general secretary and spokesperson Kunal Ghosh said that the BJP agitation programme is a ‘failure’.
“The police had worked hard to tackle the situation by firing tear gas and water cannons. BJP’s programme is a failure. BJP’s programme had affected common people,” said Ghosh.
However, all the detained BJP leaders were later released.
