BJP calls bandh, stages protest outside Kolkata Police HQ

The West Bengal government has urged people not to participate in BJP’s 12-hour general strike on August 28, asserting that the administration will ensure normal life is not affected due to the bandh.

The BJP has called for a 6 am-to-6 pm general strike in West Bengal to protest against the police action on those who took part in the march to state secretariat Nabbana on Tuesday.

“The government will not allow any bandh on Wednesday. We urge people not to participate in it. All steps shall be taken to ensure that normal life is unaffected,” said Alapan Bandopadhyay, the chief advisor to Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee.

He said transport services will remain operational, and shops, marketplaces and other business establishments have been asked to remain open.

Bandopadhyay also urged state government employees to attend office.

The ruling TMC claimed that the strike call exposed the BJP’s game plan to foment disturbances in the state exploiting people’s pain over the alleged rape and murder of a woman doctor.

TMC leader Kunal Ghosh said, “We have been stating from the very beginning that the Chhatra Samaj-sponsored Nabanna Abhijan had the backing of the BJP. This was apparent the way miscreants masquerading as student protestors created large-scale disturbances in the name of peaceful protests today. This was clear by the way the BJP lost no time to give call for a bandh to foment disturbances.”

He said the people of the state would foil the game plan of the BJP. To a question, Ghosh said TMC activists will work to ensure normal life but they have been asked not to resist the BJP workers.

Earlier, BJP state president and Union minister Sukanta Majumdar said: “We are forced to give the dawn-to-dusk strike call for a general strike as this autocratic regime is turning a deaf ear to the voices of people, the demand for justice for the deceased doctor sister. Instead of justice, Mamata Banerjee’s police are turning on the peace-loving people of the state, who only wanted a safe and secure environment for women.”

Leader of Opposition Suvendu Adhikari told reporters: “The police unleashed unthinkable oppression on the peaceful student marchers to Nabanna during the day. If Mamata Banerjee’s police treat peaceful democratic protestors in this way, we will bring the entire state to a halt tomorrow.”

Listing other agitational programmes of BJP in protest against the R G Kar incident, Majumdar said instead of August 28 as announced earlier, his party will launch a sit-in at Esplanade in the heart of Kolkata on August 29.

The office of the state Women’s Commission will be gheraoed and locked from outside on August 30, while there will be a chakka jam on September 6.

Majumdar, who later led a rally to police headquarters Lalbazar to meet the Police Commissioner, was prevented by the force. He and other leaders staged a sit-in at the spot where they were stopped by the police.

“The (BJP) state president demanded unconditional release of the students who were arrested from various locations during the march to Nabanna,” a party state leader said.

“The next course of action will be decided after a response from Lalbazar,” he said.

To provide legal help to the arrested participants of Nabanna Abhijan, BJP has opened a helpline, Majumdar said.