Large scale violence rocked the Joynagar Police Station area in Bengal’s South 24 Parganas district on Monday morning comprising a double murder followed by wanton loot and arson perpetrated allegedly by local Trinamul Congress workers.

In what is believed to be a retaliation to a local TMC leader, Saifuddin Laskar, getting shot dead by unidentified miscreants in Bamangachhi, Trinamul-sheltered miscreants raided the Doluakhaki village in the same police station area and set ablaze some 15-20 houses belonging to CPI-M supporters right before police’s eyes who did little to stop the arsonists, eye witnesses claimed, incinerating the dwellings to ashes after looting the valuables kept inside while ransacking a quite a few other houses.

TMC leader Saifuddin Laskar who was shot dead on Monday morning.

A large contingent of police and Rapid Action Force personnel were deputed in the area which continued to simmer in tension.

The incident brought back eerie remainders of the Bogtui carnage of 21 March, 2022 where houses were set on fire in a similar fashion resulting in 10 deaths, including women and children, following the brutal murder of a local TMC leader, Bhadu Sheikh.

The chain of events in Joynagar on the day after Kali Puja celebrations was triggered by the murder of Laskar who died before reaching hospital after five motorcycle-borne assailants pumped a bullet in his back. Laskar, the local area president of the ruling TMC, was on his way to a local mosque to pray at around 5 o’clock in the morning when he was attacked. While the victim’s wife is the local gram panchayat pradhan, Laskar himself was a panchayat member of Bamangachhi.

Following the shootout, villagers and local TMC workers allegedly nabbed two of the five attackers and thrashed them severely. While one of the two suspected assailants succumbed to his injuries from mob fury, the second person, Saharul Sheikh, a resident of neighbourhood Usti area, was rescued by police and taken into custody. The lynching took place some 500 metres from the site of the shootout, eyewitnesses claimed.

A video shot on a mobile phone making rounds showed angry villagers holding a man, who seemed to be one of the attackers on Laskar, who confirmed that he was part of the group which carried out the operation but did not reveal whose instructions he acted upon. The Telegraph Online independently did not verify the authenticity of the video.

But what unfolded next looked like a Bogtui redux. At around 7 AM, a mob of some 200-300 people attacked the locality of Doluakhaki Naskar Para, some five kilometers away from where Laskar was shot, and carried out a rampage which lasted for nearly four hours. Alleging CPI-M supporters were behind Laskar’s murder, the miscreants set on fire the houses belonging to CPI-M supporters and workers forcing all male members to flee the village. The women and children who stayed behind too weren’t spared the ire of the TMC raiders who too were allegedly beaten up. The victims alleged that the attackers, armed with crude bombs and sharp weapons, looted valuables and ransacked belongings before dousing the dwellings with petrol and torching them. The mob reportedly also threatened to return after sundown for another round of assault, villagers said.

Villagers further alleged that the rampage took place right before the eyes of the local police who did nothing to stop the attackers. Fire tenders allegedly also weren’t allowed to enter the area by the rampaging mob and by the time the trucks were finally allowed inside, the damage done was beyond salvation leaving the affected families scarred and homeless.

Police, interestingly, claimed that it “sprung into action immediately after the unfortunate incident of TMC leader’s murder took place”. “We cannot compare the mob action with that of Bogtui. There has been no loss of life, not even of domestic animals,” an officer on the spot said, while maintaining that these were early days in investigation and concrete leads into the motive or the masterminds of the TMC leader murder were yet to be had.

While Shaukat Mollah, local TMC leader, claimed that the Laskar’s murder was orchestrated by the CPI-M and the BJP together, party spokesperson Santanu Sen said that what followed the murder was “a spontaneous outpour of people’s anger since Laskar was popular among the local people.” “It’s because Mamata Banerjee prioritized change over revenge, our workers are getting killed in much greater numbers in the hands of the opposition than the other way round,” Sen remarked.

Sujan Chakraborty, CPI-M leader, rubbished those claims. “The TMC has captured all 23 panchayat seats in the area. The CPI-M is barely able to find a foothold in the region in the wake of sustained attacks and intimidation from the ruling party. They used this as an excuse to carry out an organized attack on the handful of CPI-M supporters who remain in the area, that too under the cover of police protection,” he alleged.

Chakraborty claimed that Laskar’s murder was a fall out of Trinamul infighting over shares in panchayat money. “Everyone knows that there is major tussle between TMC’s own leaders over the share of corruption money at the panchayat level which gets siphoned off from public schemes. The Bogtui murder and many more bear testimony to that and this one was no different.”

“The incident shows that Mamata Banerjee has lost control over her police and administration,” claimed Sukanta Majumdar, BJP state president. “Why else would TMC cadres take up law in their own hands and deliver punishment? It’s because the TMC cadres don’t have faith in Banerjee’s police,” Majumdar added.

Congress leader Adhir Chowdhury felt the incidents, caused by “slackness in police action”, could lead to another chain of violent incidents . “What are the police doing? The TMC cadres are playing the roles of judges and the police have no role to play?” he asked.