Ratul, age 31, an ex-student of Kolkata Medical College and an activist in the health movement and trade union movement got arrested from his home, Belghadia, Kolkata on the night of April 8. In the FIR that has been registered against him, he has been slapped with cases pertaining to unlawful assembly, rioting, causing grievous hurt, attempt to murder, criminal conspiracy and other such serious sections.
On April 6, the Kashipur police arrested Shankar Das, Biswajit Hazra and Amitava Bhattacharya, three activists of the Bhangar struggle. Shankar Das is one of the conveners of the Bhangar Solidarity Committee and rest two members of “Committee for the Protection of Land, Livelihood and Environment” of the Bhangar struggle. In 2017 too, Shankar Das was arrested similarly on false charges.
In the recent incident, on April 6, the three of them went to file nominations for the upcoming Panchayat elections. The Committee for Protection of Land, Livelihood and Environment had earlier decided to participate in elections in 14 villages of both South 21 Paragana and North 21 Paragana in order to get representation in local bodies so that they could strengthen the struggle of anti-land grab movement going on in Bhangar.
However, the goons of the ruling TMC party allegedly beat up the villagers within the BDO office itself as police stood by like mere spectators, later arresting the activists and villagers and not the goons. The arrested villagers have been reportedly slapped with multiple false cases.
Further, as per the activists of the Bhangar movement, the TMC goons attacked villagers on April 8, burnt down the office of the ‘Committee’ and have bombed and fired randomly to create an atmosphere of terror. “These repressive tactics are being used to crush the anti-land grab movement of Bhangar, so that corporates’ plans of establishing Power Grids can be facilitated without any opposition. The goons wanted to ensure that no nominations are filed by the villagers” said Priyasmita, a student activist closely associated with the Bhangar struggle.
The repression on the Bhangar movement, which started in 2016 to oppose the alleged forcible land acquisition by the Power Grid Corporation of India, a central PSU, to set up power grid, has been growing. In 2017, the activists of the movement faced severe repression where several of them were lathi-charged during a demonstration by the Mamta Banerjee led TMC government. Later, activists were booked under the draconian UAPA which was very shocking. In total, as many as 110 people were booked under false cases, a student activist with the movement, Priyasmita, a student activist associated with the movement alleges. Of these, UAPA was slapped against as many as 16 activists. Activists believe that whenever pressure is built by the movement to oppose the said grid construction, the state repression increases, as has happened in the recent case too.
Activists have demanded immediate release of Bhangar Committee activists.