Bengal BJP distances itself from mob violence; central leadership all praise for protest

The Bengal BJP has distanced itself from the violence unleashed during its anti-corruption march on Tuesday even as the party’s much-hyped protest programme left it red in the face.

Absence of the BJP central in-charges and “lack of grit” shown by the trinity of its state unit during the stir have become a target of TMC jeers as well as topics of hush-hush discussions within its own circle.

BJP national general secretary Sunil Bansal and former Bihar minister Mangal Pandey are the saffron party’s Bengal in-charges. Besides, its IT cell national convenor Amit Malviya functions as co-incharge of the state unit.

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The trio did not take part in the ‘Nabanna Abhijan’, the march to the state’s temporary seat of power in Howrah to protest alleged corruption of the TMC regime.

Keeping a safe distance

A senior BJP leader told The Federal that the three central leaders were not even present in the state, let alone be on the streets to “slug it out” alongside ordinary party workers.

“At least Kailash Vijayvargiyaji (the former party in-charge) used to lead from the front. He had himself taken part and faced police brutality when such street protests were organized during his tenure,” a BJP leader from north Bengal said on condition of anonymity.

Malviya was busy tweeting about the development by holding himself at a comfortable distance, little realizing that the political battle here is fought on the streets and not on the social media, the BJP leader alleged. The other two gave the event a complete miss, he added.

Many in the BJP are also not happy with the role played during the protest by state president Sukanta Majumdar, leader of the opposition Suvendu Adhikari and former state president Dilip Ghosh. The troika was entrusted to lead the march from three different directions to reach as close as possible to Nabanna, their destination.

State party leaders create confusion

Adhikari was to lead the march from Santragachi. But even before reaching there he got detained. TMC spokesperson Kunal Ghosh later took a dig at the leader of the opposition in the state assembly for “meekly courting the arrest.”

Ghosh took out the procession from College Square. He was given relatively a free run by allowing him to march without any obstacle up to near the Rabindra Setu, popularly known as Howrah bridge — a distance of about 4 km.

Once he and his supporters were stopped near the bridge using water cannons and tear gas by police, they disbursed. Ghosh even called-off the protest programme, creating confusion as the party state president had then just started his march from Howrah Maidan. Majumdar quickly negated Ghosh’s announcement saying the programme was on.

The procession Majumdar was leading, however, could not proceed very far as it soon hit the police barricade. He was taken into police custody and soon the protest fizzled out much before reaching the secretariat.

The BJP had set the target of bringing a few lakhs of people to lay the siege. But as per its own internal assessment, the turnout was hardly 50,000.

Before dispersing, BJP workers however fought pitched battles with police in several places, especially at Santragachi. It resulted in injuries on both sides. A group of BJP workers on their way back also set a police vehicle on fire and attacked a police officer after finding him alone.

Stating that the arrest of senior leaders left the protest “leaderless” and was “bound to descend into chaos,” senior BJP leader Tathagata Roy in a tweet said only due to “panic” and “over reaction” of the police, the programme had a façade of success.

Central BJP leaders ‘happy’

The BJP central leadership however appeared happy with the outcome of its protest programme. The party sources said its national president J P Nadda himself called up Adhikari and Majumdar last night to congratulate them for the “success” of the programme.

Meanwhile, the BJP on Wednesday claimed that those involved in violence were not associated with the party after police, based on CCTV footage of the incidents, arrested 13 people, including three for assaulting Kolkata Police’s assistant commissioner Debjit Chatterjee and one for setting ablaze the vehicle. Many more arrests are likely as police are preparing a list of vandals based on the footage.

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Majumdar on Wednesday called the police officer undergoing treatment for his fractured hand and inquired about his condition. TMC leader and minister Firhad Hakim also paid a visit to BJP councillor Meena Devi Purohit, who sustained head injuries in a scuffle with police during the protest march.

TMC MP Mahua Moitra took a dig at the BJP for resorting to vandalism, asking in a tweet, what if Bengal used the UP model and sent “bulldozers” to homes of BJP workers who had destroyed public property.