Baranagar erupts into violence between TMC and BJP workers ::: "Police stood like mute dolls," says Lotus party candidate Sajal Ghosh

Sayantika Banerjee is the sitting MLA and the actress-turned-politician is contesting again. The BJP nominee is Sajal Ghosh. 

"There was violence because Trinamool Congress has realised that they would lose the election this time ... scores of TMC councillors came to the spot. But my tiger-like (Baager-bachha); BJP workers raised 'Go back' slogan," he told TV journalists.  

Baranagar Assembly constituency is part of Dum Dum Lok Sabha constituency. 

Senior parliamentarian Saugata Roy is the sitting MP.  The assembly segment has a historical context. Between 1951 aand 1971, the seat was represented by none other than CPI-M stalwart Jyoti Basu.  

Ghosh claimed -- "In an internal meeting of TMC leaders, MP Saugata Roy has cautioned party workers that this time they will not win the election. And hence this clash over poster wars has been triggered".

Earlier reports said BJP and TMC supporters clashed over campaign posters both sides making accusations of "outsiders" causing disruptions. 

In the tense atmosphere after an hour or so; central forces were deployed to disperse the crowds peacefully.

Ghosh claimed : "The violence worked in favour of TMC worked earlier. This time it will not ... the ground underneath has moved very fast". 

 

 

Unlike its glorious intellectual and cultural past, West Bengal today is often described as a landscape of violence, turmoil, and persistent economic stagnation. 

The state that once produced Tagore, Vivekananda, Nazrul Islam, Satyajit Ray and Amartya Sen is now better known nationally for political killings, flight of capital, and social intimidation.

West Bengal Chief Minister and Trinamool Congress supremo Mamata Banerjee on Saturday vowed to continue her crusade against the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise, alleging that voter deletions were targeting “particularly one community,” just 20 hours after criticising the BJP and the Election Commission of India (ECI).

She came down heavily on Prime Minister Narendra Modi, accusing him of orchestrating the deletion of voters from the post-SIR electoral rolls.

Addressing thousands of worshippers after Eid prayers at Kolkata’s Red Road, Mamata Banerjee, alongside Abhishek Banerjee, national general secretary of the party, said, “The fight we started against the SIR will be continued. The large-scale deletions of voters’ names were part of broader attempts to influence the electoral process in the state.”

Mamata has been protesting against the SIR of electoral rolls since the exercise was launched in the state on November 4 last year and has intensified her attacks on the BJP-led government at the Centre and the ECI through rallies and programmes ahead of the assembly polls, which she is expected to face for the first time since 2011 when the Trinamool Congress-led government came to power in Bengal.

“Large numbers of voter names have been removed in the name of the SIR. I am fighting against this and have even moved the court. Our fight against the exercise will remain unabated to protect democracy and the rights of every citizen. We won’t allow Modiji to snatch away people’s voting rights,” she said at the Red Road gathering