The Kolkata Police on Friday booked senior Bharatiya Janata party (BJP) leaders and party MPs for unlawful assembly during the party’s march to the State Secretariat on Thursday. A case registered at Hastings police station named 24 people, including senior BJP leaders Kailash Vijayvargiya, Mukul Roy, Arjun Singh and Locket Chatterjee and booked them for “unlawful assembly having their common object to approach Nabanna i.e. high security zone”.
Other charges pressed against the BJP leaders were under different sections of Indian Penal Code (IPC) such as143 (unlawful assembly), 147 (rioting), 149 and 332 (voluntarily causing hurt to any person being a public servant), 353 (deter public servant from discharge of his duty), 283 (danger or obstruction in public way) and section 51(B) of Disaster Management Act and various sections of Prevention of Damage to Public Property.
During the march to the State Secretariat on Thursday, the BJP leaders had assembled at Hastings. “On being defended by the on duty Police personnel, they damaged the govt. property like iron guard rails, wooden shields, iron face shields..,” the FIR said.
Reacting to the developments, West Bengal unit BJP president Dilip Ghosh said the cases against them were “shameful”. “This is not how a democracy works, we will fight it legally,” said Mr. Ghosh who also led a “silent rally” during the day to protest the police action on party supporters during Thursday’s march.
Surya’s complaint
Meanwhile, in another development late on Thursday evening BJP MP and head of BJP’s youth wing Tejasvi Surya got into an altercation with the police at Jorasanko police station, when he visited it to file a police complaint.
“We waited for more than 2 hours, well into midnight, for police to register FIR upon our complaint. They instead manhandled 3 Members of Parliament. We will file a motion for breach of privilege & teach Mamata’s police a lesson in constitutional propriety,” Mr. Surya tweeted. The police refuted allegations of any mistreatment of the MPs.
