On a day when West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee cut short her visit to New Delhi and returned to the city, attacks on the offices of the Left parties and their affiliated organisations continued for the second day here on Wednesday.
“We have unequivocally condemned the incident that occurred yesterday. But we find that since then in all the districts of the State horrific attacks have been perpetrated … So far, we have received information that about 1,000 offices of the Left parties and other mass organisations have been attacked,” chairman of the State Left Front Committee Biman Bose told journalists.
Mr. Bose said that just as the manner of the protests that included heckling of the Finance Minister Amit Mitra outside the office of the Planning Commission was condemnable, “we also condemn the violence being perpetrated by Trinamool Congress across the State.”
During the day, Ms. Banerjee returned to the city and was admitted to a private nursing home with complaints of body aches, breathing problems and palpitation. She was advised rest.
The Trinamool Congress organised protest marches, processions and demonstrations across the State condemning the developments in New Delhi.
One such protest took a violent turn when a group of people, allegedly activists of the Trinamool Congress Chhatra Parishad, the party’s student wing, barged into the premises of Presidency University. They beat up some of the students and vandalised property.
Pointing out that Ms. Banerjee prided herself on the “law and order situation in the State being very high,” Mr. Bose questioned the role of the law enforcement agencies and their failure in preventing these attacks.
Ashok Bhattacharya, former minister in the Left Front government, was held by the police in Siliguri for allegedly stirring up trouble. However, only a short while earlier, the CPI(M) office was attacked by Trinamool Congress activists. Asked to comment on Ms. Banerjee’s remarks in New Delhi that “there is no violence in Bengal,” Mr. Bose said that if Ms. Banerjee could dismiss the custodial death of Students Federation of India (SFI) leader Sudipta Gupta as a “petty matter,” it was not likely that the widespread violence would be taken seriously.
Asked what action has been taken against those who were responsible for the heckling of Mr. Mitra, Mr. Bose quoted from the statement issued by the Polit Bureau of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) and said the party would decide on the issue. “It is undeniable that the CPI(M) workers were present there, and it will have to be identified who were present and their role in the incident.”