West Bengal Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar on Monday accused Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee of ignoring his message to speak with her “urgently” over the killing of a Bharatiya Janata Party leader in the state.
Dhankhar had called a meeting after motorcycle-borne assailants shot dead Bharatiya Janata Party leader Manish Shukla on Sunday in Titagarh in North 24 Parganas district when he was speaking with local residents and party workers near a police station. The saffron party blamed the ruling Trinamool Congress for the killing.
The governor tweeted that the law and order situation in the state has “nosedived” alarmingly, adding that neither the additional chief secretary of home affairs nor the director general of police responded to the “targeted political killings.”
Dhankhar added that he sent a message to Banerjee at 10.47 pm, asking to speak with her urgently, but she did not respond.
Late on Sunday, the governor had summoned the home secretary and the director general of police to Raj Bhawan at 10 am the next day to discuss the “worsening law and order situation leading to dastardly killing of Manish Shukla”.
After the killing, BJP General Secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya demanded an inquiry by the Central Bureau of Investigation. “[Manish] Shukla was murdered,” he said. “We demand a probe by the Central Bureau of Investigation into the role of the police. Arjun Singh’s life is also in danger. Mamata Banerjee cannot rule the state with terror.”
TMC’s Panihati legislator, Nirmal Ghosh, however, said the ruling party had no role in the attack. “This is a fallout of rivalry inside the BJP,” he claimed.
The BJP has called for a 12-hour shut down in the Barrackpore area on Monday.
The governor and the chief minister have been in a feud over various topics, including law and order and the government’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic.
On September 28, Dhankhar had accused the Banerjee-led government of turning the West Bengal into a police state. He had claimed that terror modules were running in the state and the government was conducting electronic surveillance.
He had also raised questions on the “orchestrated political killings, fake cases, political vendetta, [and] ruthless quelling of Opposition.”
Dilip Ghosh compares law and order in Bengal to Bihar, UP
West Bengal BJP chief Dilip Ghosh on Monday compared the law and order situation in the state to that in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh – both ruled by the BJP, according to The Indian Express. “West Bengal is gradually becoming a mafia-ruled state like Bihar and Uttar Pradesh,” said Ghosh. “The fact that a popular leader was shot dead in broad daylight is evidence enough that there is no law and order in West Bengal.”
Ghosh also accused the police of inaction and cast doubts on how fair the elections in the state will be if the alleged political killings continued.
On Sunday, Ghosh had raised questions on the killing of Shukla, asking if justice can be expected from the state government. “The horrific murder of BJP’s youth leader, lawyer and former councillor Manish Shukla is reprehensible,” he tweeted. “This is an example of the bloody politics of Paschim Banga under [the] TMC.”
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