Santipur, Oct. 25: Adhir Sarkar, an elderly BJP activist was allegedly beaten to death by some suspected Trinamul Congress supporters at a rural market in Nadia’s Santipur on Wednesday night. The victim was the vice president of Booth -17 in Baro Jiakur village under Arbandi panchayat, where he lived.
Police and local sources said the incident occurred at about 7 pm, when the deceased who was walking in an immersion rally of Durga puja, was dragged out by some Trinamul supporters and beaten up randomly which eventually led to the death.
Some local persons found the elderly man lying unconscious on the road and called police. He was rushed to Santipur State General Hospital, where doctors declared him brought dead. Some eyewitnesses claimed that they had seen some persons kicking and punching the elderly man at random, while he was crying for mercy.
The incident sparked tension in the area as well as in Santipur town, as BJP supporters staged a demonstration in front of the Hospital and also gheraoed police officers when they arrived there.
Police have begun a case of unnatural death in the absence of any complaint. However, the exact reason behind the alleged murder could not be immediately ascertained. The sleuths, meanwhile, have not ruled out a possible angle of personal enmity.
Local sources said that the demised leader had recently been involved in a controversy after allegedly making some derogatory remarks about the inter-caste marriage of a local Trinamul supporter. However, the BJP leadership has refused to acknowledge any such incident as the reason behind the alleged murder. “It is a planned attack to terrorize our party workers in the locality”, a BJP leader said.
In the rural poll, BJP took control of the Santipur panchayat samiti and also defeated Trinamul in the Arbandi gram panchayat securing 10 out of 19 seats.
Senior BJP leader and opposition leader in the assembly Suvendu Adhikari has accused the Trinamul Congress of death. In his official X handle, he said, “Even the festive season in WB hasn’t deterred the TMC goons from engaging in violence and carry out attacks on opposition political workers; especially those from the BJP”.
He told police to arrest the culprits while reminding them that “….Any laxity shown by the Police to facilitate the criminals associated with the ruling party in evading arrest would be dealt with appropriate legal measures”.
BJP leader Chanchal Chakraborty, “This is a planned attack to terrorize BJP supporters in the area as they toiled hard to defeat the ruling party in the Santipur panchayat samiti and the local gram panchayat. Trinamul goons have become desperate to take revenge while police preferred to remain a mute spectator”. Local Trinamul leadership, however, refuted the allegation.