Irony died and went to hell when West Bengal CM and TMC supremo Mamata Banerjee, after leading a procession on the eve of Women’s Day on Thursday (March 7) asserted that West Bengal is the safest State for women.
Claiming that the reports of atrocities on women at Sandeshkhali were misleading, Mamata said, “Bengal is the only place where women are safe, it is the safest place.”
#WATCH | West Bengal CM &TMC chairperson Mamata Banerjee addressing TMC Mahila Wing Rally in Kolkata says, "…I challenge BJP and say that Bengal is the only place where women are safe…" pic.twitter.com/PO2DmgkfZ1
— ANI (@ANI) March 7, 2024
What an astonishing paradox it is to witness that while Mamata Banerjee stood on a dias, that too on the eve of women’s day, making tall assertions about women’s safety and security in her state, the West Bengal police, working at her behest, on that very day, unlawfully detained BJP women leaders en route Sandeshkhali to meet the several local women who have been voicing their outrage against the institutionalised sexual exploitation, rape, property encroachment, and corruption they have suffered at the hands of the influential TMC leader and his goons.
In fact, BJP member and former IPS officer Bharati Ghosh, who along with party state secretary Agnimitra Paul and Locket Chatterjee was detained on Thursday evening by the West Bengal police in the New Town area in Kolkata, took to X to inform how she was dragged, beaten and then illegally detained for hours. She posted a video of herself being physically assaulted by three female police officers, shoved into a police jeep, and taken to the police station.
Prime Minister @narendramodi said on Wednesday that Sandeshkhali will bring a storm..
— Bharati Ghosh (Modi Ka Parivar) (@BharatiGhosh1) March 7, 2024
The storm has arrived.
State sponsored attack on me when I started for Sandeshkhali in my car with BJP’s Mahila morcha team.
My car was stopped by police at the New Town road. I was told… pic.twitter.com/gFZsAGaUlj
Agnimitra Paul, BJP MLA representing Asansol South, said that the team only intended to visit areas in Sandeshkhali which remained outside the ambit of the prohibitory section. “Is section 144 imposed in Kolkata? On what grounds can the police stop our movement here?” she questioned.
The police and the TMC still have a lot to hide in Sandeshkhali even though a lot of the atrocities committed there have already been exposed, Locket Chatterjee, an MP from Hooghly, maintained.
BJP leader Falguni Patra, who was also part of the team, added, “We merely wanted to be on the side of the tormented women in Sandeshkhali who are still reeling under fear since musclemen of Shahjahan Sheikh are still at large and police are doing little to address their concerns.”
In these last two months, the state police, working at Mamata Banerjee’ behest, have been trying to do whatever it takes to hush up the matter, even if it means abusing, assaulting and mistreating the women victims or those who have been attempting to meet with the victims at Sandeshkhali.
The Sandehkhali issue has become a source of gnawing anxiety for the West Bengal government after it has been at the centre of protests since February with local residents, especially women coming out in huge numbers narrating the atrocities they have been subjected to by Trinamool Congress leader Shahjahan Sheikh and his aides who enjoyed political patronage and impunity from police action for all these days until the media unravelled the shocking truth.
Several such testimonies emerged as the Sandeshkhali issue snowballed. Women spoke of how their husbands were intimidated and threatened if they dared to protest against the sexual exploitation of their wives.
OpIndia had compiled 12 videos where victims narrated the ordeal faced by them.
According to Republic Bangla, the police accompanied the Trinamool Congress workers and harassed the women protesting against party goons Sheikh Shahjahan, Uttam Sardar, and Shibo Prasad Hazra.
Other residents of Sandeshkhali recounted the ill-treatment by the local cops. One woman was heard saying, “The police asked me if I sleep with other men. How could they ask me this? I need an answer. What wrong have I committed to be insulted with abuses like mother f*cker?”
“The police abused my husband as a ‘son of a pig.’ He was pulled out of the house. What crime did he commit? We need justice. Can the police personnel abuse someone like this?” she continued.
Recently when the chairperson of the National Commission for Women (NCW) Rekha Sharma visited the Sandeshkhali village, she also accused the state administration of suppressing the voice of the victims so that the truth would not come out.
In fact, the National Commission for Women (NCW) had also said in its report that its fact-finding team in West Bengal’s Sandeshkhali found that women who spoke out against the atrocities faced reprisals.
“Our inquiry committee found that the victims in West Bengal are being threatened by local police, deterring them from coming out and reporting instances of sexual and physical harassment. Victims also recounted instances of physical and sexual violence perpetrated by both police officers and members of the TMC.”
“Disturbing testimonies gathered from women in the village painted a harrowing picture of widespread fear and systematic abuse. Victims in Sandeshkhali recounted instances of physical and sexual violence perpetrated by both police officers and members of the Trinamool Congress (TMC),” the NCW report read.
Speaking further about the West Bengal police excesses, on March 6, BJP leaders alleged that the West Bengal police tried to stop a few buses in which women of Sandeshkhali were travelling to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s rally in West Bengal’s Barasat citing ‘security protocol’.
The state BJP made arrangements for buses to take the women of Sandeshkhali, who were allegedly tortured by suspended TMC leader Shajahan Sheikh and his aides, to the rally venue, around 80 km away.
“The buses were first stopped at the Biswa Bangla Gate in New Town, and then again at Airport Gate 1 on the way to Barasat, citing security protocol. The police are trying to stop us from going to the PM’s rally,” a BJP leader on one of the buses alleged.
On March 9, Calcutta HC gave a nod to 80 women from Sandeshkhali to file affidavits. This came after advocate Priyanka Tibrewal, who was representing the group of women victims of Sandeshkhali, said that these women had wanted to file their complaints earlier but were not allowed by the local police.
Tibrewal said, “These women had wanted to file a complaint but police did not allow them. I mentioned that before the Honourable High Court. The Chief Justice allowed them to file an application before the court.”
The West Bengal police’s conduct towards the Sandeshkhali women victims or those who wished to reach out to them has been certainly appalling, but not shocking. This is the harsh reality of West Bengal. While Mamata Banerjee makes tall claims of women being the safest in her state, there are multiple instances where women have been mistreated; harassed and victimised in the mafia rule of the TMC government led by her.
The Governor of West Bengal has recently reiterated these same facts. Upon hearing the stories of the victimised women and their relatives in Sandeshkhali, Governor C V Ananda Bose became deeply emotional and burst into anger, “What I saw was ghastly, shocking, shattering to my senses. I saw something I should never have seen; I heard many things I should never have heard. I cannot believe this could happen in Kabiguru Rabindranath Tagore’s land,” he lamented.
One wonders what rational people think of West Bengal’s growing rate of horrific criminality against women. It is despicable and inhumane that politicians who win support by making lofty promises then take advantage of weak and helpless women; and Mamata Banerjee, the state’s chief minister, not only looks for ways to shield these criminals but also employs the state apparatus to silence voices that dare to speak against her ‘jungle raj’.
West Bengal’s disturbing legacy of post-poll violence had shown its macabre face once again and that time too it were the women in the state who bore the brunt of the violence in the worst possible way.
Following the Assembly elections in May 2021, the state of West Bengal saw phenomenal anarchy and bloodshed. Several BJP activists were attacked, intimidated, and killed during the Trinamool Congress-sponsored bloodbath. After the Trinamool Congress (TMC) won the West Bengal Vidhan Sabha elections, party thugs went mad and attacked BJP members in the state.
On May 30, 2021, the Group of Intellectuals and Academicians (GIA) has submitted a report on the post-poll violence in West Bengal where they have documented the concerted campaign against opposition party workers by the cadres of the Trinamool Congress. The report documented several instances of sexual assault on women by TMC cadres due to political motivations.
How women in Mamata Banerjee’s West Bengal were victimised after Assembly elections in May 2021
OpIndia had also reached out to some of the victims of the violence and spoke with them about their horrific experiences, which they claim were overtly sponsored by West Bengal’s state apparatus. We were told how TMC men had gone on a killing, arson, and raping spree against Hindus. Several victims had spoken to journalists about the sexual exploitation and the rape they had been subjected to at the hands of TMC goons after Mamata Banerjee won a landslide victory in Assembly Elections. During the violence itself, the police were woefully unavailable. They had refused to take action against the TMC goons.
OpIndia had spoken to one such victim who was gang-raped in front of her father by goons who demanded “Hindu women” specifically. While she came on record, there were several who could not. First, they were already in fear. Second, they knew that they had to live and survive in the very area where even the police would protect the goons who tormented them. Having no avenue to safeguard themselves, the victims refused to come on record and file complaints. As such, those stories would forever remain buried because, without any evidence or victim testimony, it would be impossible to report.
Women from Sandeshkhali are narrating horror stories. ‘They violate women they pick night after night, release her only when they are “satisfied”, one said narrating the terror of TMC leader Sheikh Shahjahan and his men. This is what I had said post poll violence. Nothing changes pic.twitter.com/xzMdVpU0Q5
— Nupur J Sharma (@UnSubtleDesi) February 10, 2024
The West Bengal Police labelled some of the unsettling instances that spread via social media as ‘fake’, or normalised them as part of the post-election process, but the voices continued to linger.
A report by Organiser also penned down the horrifying story of a few of such women, who had to pay the price of supporting BJP in Mamata’s West Bengal.
BJP polling agent from West Bengal Pinky Baj recounts the atrocities inflicted on her family by TMC cadres. In her complaint to the National Commission for Scheduled Castes, New Delhi, one Pinky Baj (34), resident of Jaygram, village, North Parganas, West Bengal, revealed the horror that unfolded on May 2, when Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress returned to power in the state.
Pinky alleged that around 7:30 pm on May 2, around 50 TMC goons led by Mujaffar Baidya, Mahabur Baidya, Akhar Bhagi, Aja Mullah, Labawali Gazi and others barged into her house. “They started abusing me in the filthiest language. They started beating us with bamboo sticks, iron rods, their bare hands, and destroyed each and everything in the house and looted items worth 3 lakhs.”
“Jaisi tumhari Hindu devi maa Kaali n*ngi hai.. waise hi tumko n*nga karenge (the way your Hindu devi Kaali is naked, we will make you naked as well)”, they attacked my religious belief by abusing my God, lamented the BJP worker. She alleged that they hurled filthy abuses at her and threatened to rape her and also hurled sexually explicit abuses towards Goddess Kaali and Lord Ram.
“They have tortured me physically, mentally and attacked my religious belief by abusing my God. It is such a humiliation that I cannot forget it ever in my life,” rued the BJP polling agent while narrating her horrific tale.
However, according to Organiser, the TMC goons had started harassing the BJP supporter much prior to May 2. In fact, on April 17, Pinky, who belongs to the schedule caste community, was present at the polling booth, when the TMC cadres approached her and started hurling casteist abuses at her. Using extremely derogatory language against her, the TMC goons threatened to rape and thereafter shoot her when their party comes back to power.
BJP worker Aparna Das raped, poisoned by TMC goons in West Bengal during post-poll violence
Likewise, BJP worker Aparna Das, resident of Barotola in Khejuri Vidhan Sabha also left her village due to the constant harassment she was subjected to by the TMC goons. Recalling how TMC goons raped and poisoned her, Das said she would return to her village after 5 years if the BJP forms the government in Bengal.
BJP worker daughter gang-raped on gun point in front of the father
Likewise, Diya Guha (21) from Birbhum, alleged that on May 2, local TMC leader Mamul Sheikh, and 10 to 12 other TMC goons belonging to the Muslim community barged into her house where she lives with her father, a BJP worker, and started thrashing everyone.
“They tore my clothes and when my father tried to save me, they beat him up brutally and said, “Nahi hum logon ko tu nahi chahiye.. teri beti chahiye .. hum logon ko Hindu ladki chahiye. (We don’t want you we want your daughter. We want a Hindu girl)”.
The report by Organiser further says that these TMC goons then took turns to rape the 21-year-old woman in front of her father, who was held on gun point. 7 men violated the girl one after the other, while her helpless father looked on.
TMC goons sexually assault BJP supporter from Haldipara village, Purba Bardhaman
“I am a BJP supporter, and due to this fact alone TMC goons stormed into my house to punish me and beat me up with dandas and their bare fists. They tore my saree, my blouse, and assaulted my breasts with a knife multiple times. They kept touching my private parts,” lamented one Pratima Das, from Haldipara village, Purba Bardhaman. She said that she has been kept in confinement in her own house for days now, as the TMC goons have cordoned off the whole area not allowing anyone to go out or enter the village.
This report covers just a tiny fraction of the overall situation that daunts the women of West Bengal. An outline of the horrors that a few of the countless destitute Hindu women in West Bengal have faced under Mamata’s regime.
Presently, we are left with a series of questions: Has West Bengal’s law and order collapsed to such an extent that victimised women feel compelled to look for justice outside of the state? Is Bengal, the state that boasts of having the most female MLAs in a state assembly, having a woman as chief minister, and being the “safest” state for women, content to stand by like a mute spectator and watch these horrors happen to its women? Will the civil society of Bengal also be politicised like the police force? Will the people of Bengal, who are steadfast in condemning crimes against women all across the globe, take cognisance of what is happening in their own backyard and demand an answer from the government that they brought to power for the third consecutive term?
Violence against women in West Bengal extends beyond politics. It’s a serious human rights issue here. If nothing is done quickly, soon enough the politicking would take precedence and the women would be left to fend for themselves.
