Staff Reporter / Kolkata
The clashes were reported in Kolkata and Howrah as police tried to block a BJP march to Nabanna. The march was carried out in protest against the alleged corrupt practices of the TMC government.
The clashes created widespread tension in Kolkata, Howrah Maidan and Santragachi areas for several hours. Leader of Opposition Suvendu Adhikari and MP Locket Chattopadhyay and BJP leader Rahul Sinha were detained before the rally started. The procession started from Santragachi, Howrah Maidan and College Square towards state secretariat Nabaanna.
The police already blocked approach roads by barricades at Santragachi and Howrah Maidan. When BJP workers tried to break the barricades, the police used water cannons and tear gas to disperse crowd. At Howrah Maidan, State President Sukanta Majumder, MP Jyotirmoy Singh Mahato and MLA Agnimitra Pal staged a sit-in protest. Later the police arrested them.
Police also stopped the procession of BJP workers in various places including Lalbazar, MG Road in Kolkata. Several BJP workers, including BJP councilor Meena Devi Purohit, were seriously injured by police lathi-charge.
BJP agitators brought in by special trains for a protest march to the Bengal secretariat turned violent when they found roads leading to the state’s seat of power barricaded by riot police.
A police kiosk was damaged as the demonstrators were stopped from moving forward.
Similar scenes were witnessed in Howrah, Kolkata’s Lalbazar and MG Road areas where violent protesters engaged in a scuffle with the police.
In Lalbazar, a police vehicle was set on fire.
A Kolkata Police officer said “there was no report of any serious injury to any protestors though several police personnel have suffered injuries”.
Normal life was disrupted in the city amid the protests, with common people facing huge inconvenience on the thoroughfares, many of which had plunged into chaos.
BJP state president Sukanta Majumdar staged a sit-in in Howrah after being stopped from carrying forward the rally.
“This autocratic Mamata Banerjee government does not believe in giving space to opposition parties,” he said.
Majumdar also claimed that it was a shame that the police were acting in a partisan manner, further claiming that “some of them have turned into puppets of ruling TMC”.
The BJP state chief and senior leader Agnimitra Paul were later detained from a protest site at Howrah Maidan.
BJP national vice-president Dilip Ghosh, who led the protesters near Howrah bridge, left the site in the midst of a lathicharge on his party’s supporters.
“Our fight against this jungle raj will continue,” Ghosh said.