The Bengal government took tough steps on Saturday to prevent the spread of violent protests against the “heinous” comments by now-axed BJP spokespersons Nupur Sharma and Navin Jindal, with chief minister Mamata Banerjee signalling a hardened stand against the perpetrators.
Assemblies of more than four people were banned across large swathes of Howrah district, which has witnessed most of the violent protests over the last three days. The administration set up a team of senior IPS officers to handle the situation in the district.
Howrah police commissioner C. Sudhakar and Howrah (rural) superintendent of police Soumya Roy were removed.
Sources said the measures came after the violence began spreading to new areas despite repeated pleas for peace and restraint from the chief minister and several Muslim clerics.
Mamata had in a series of tweets on Saturday morning attributed political motives to the violence, saying some political parties were trying to engineer riots.
“As I have said before, violent incidents have been taking place in Howrah for two days now. There are some political parties behind this who want to cause riots,” the chief minister tweeted.
“But these things will not be tolerated and strict action will be taken. Why should ordinary people suffer because of the BJP’s sins?”
Saturday witnessed a flurry of activity by the BJP across Bengal after state unit president Sukanta Majumdar was arrested on the charge of defying the ban on assemblies by trying to visit violence-hit areas in Howrah with a large team.
As the BJP and Trinamul leaderships fought verbally over the incidents in Howrah and some other districts, and over the administration’s handling of the situation, the government changed its approach.
A senior bureaucrat said that with the chief minister having earlier appealed to the protesters to withdraw their agitation, the authorities had initially adopted a largely hands-off approach.
“The requests didn’t yield results, and the violence began spreading. Then instructions for tough action went out from Nabanna,” a bureaucrat said.
Security personnel deployed in Howrah on Saturday. PTI picture
Assemblies were banned in large parts of the district based on intelligence that the protesters might block the national highway and railway tracks again. A Rapid Action Force team was deployed in the Panchla area of Howrah district, where the violence had spread with several shops and houses torched on Saturday.
“All this happened even with Internet services having been suspended in large parts of the district since Friday night. So, the government took a series of tough measures to ensure that the violence didn’t spread to newer areas,” a source in the administration said.
The state government also suspended Internet services in Beldanga, Murshidabad, after violent protests were reported from the area.
“The ruling establishment does not want such protests to spread as that can cause communal tensions, with Opposition parties like the BJP trying to reap benefits by stoking passions,” a cabinet minister said.
A senior police officer told The Telegraph that Praveen Tripathi, additional commissioner of Calcutta police, had been posted as the new police commissioner of Howrah.
“Praveen is an experienced officer and has been sent as a precautionary measure to prevent the violence spreading to Howrah city. The government doesn’t want any trouble in the city area,” the officer said.
He said Soumya Roy had been removed as SP as a punishment for his failure to control the situation in the district’s rural areas. He has been replaced with Swati Bhangalia.
