Victims of Sandeshkhali
There was a Press meet that I attended on February 14 at EZCC Aikatan, Salt Lake, Kolkata where I said Sandeshkhali was SARTHAKNAMA as it brought out the SANDESHA of West Bengal. Ground facts from the eastern State may appear incredible and far-fetched, however, writing would still be desirable for creating a documentation of the fact that the reality could be mapped before it was too late. Nothing on earth ever happens beyond causality and Bengal incidents too are no exception.
From the time when the soul-shaking news of the women’s fate in Sandeshkhali broke out, I had been saying, through videos in X, Facebook Reels and my own small YouTube channel, that Sandeshkhali’s was no isolated incident and Sheikh Shahjahan was no exception as different parts of West Bengal had different ‘Shahjahan’s who were oppressing women sexually. But they say truth has uncanny ways of coming out to light.
When did I first note that such things were happening to Bengal women? During working on the huge hoard of post-poll violence 2021 data information as I wrote a small book in Bengali and still writing another in English adding greater details to it though such work is taking much longer time than I thought it would take. The violence displayed a particular religious pattern. An eminent journalist of national repute called me when post-poll violence 2021 was going on. I told him about my observation. He asked, how to decipher reliably that it had a religious pattern? “Are they giving the known slogans?” I said, “not those slogans they cried on Direct Action Day or in Noakhali or in Kashmir but they are doing the same thing.”
Here the slogan is different. “Khela Hobe” is the Bengal cry before attacking women objectifying their sexuality. How to realize the insinuation of crying “Khela Hobe”? After Sandeshkhali horror came to light, West Bengal Irrigation Minister Partha Bhowmik visited the place on February 14. Without even meeting the complainant women, he addressed a public rally and lightly floated in hissing sound (as if sending a signal) the question to the crowd, “Khela Hobe?” And the crowd went awkwardly jubilant as if the signal had reached.
Some people are saying Sandeshkhali is witnessing a repeat show of Noakhali. However, in Noakhali, the enemy attacked directly with arms and weapons to perpetrate a genocide. So they did in August 1946 in Calcutta too. But Sandeshkhali is a different strategic ball game of no physical genocide but turning Hindus DHIMMIS, devastating them from within, subjugating their moral. Sexual attack on women is such an attack which will demoralise Hindus for ever and the enemy expects them to either stay as Dhimmis at their disposal or leave the place, as if a different version of “Raliv Galiv Tsaliv”. Keeping the objective the same, the mechanism here is different.
Not that the Sandeshkhali perpetrators didn’t wield weapons at their target groups. Rather, one of the numerous allegations against Sheikh Shahjahan is that “he comes with outsiders & guns like AK47 to terrorize the people”.— At the same time, his modus operandi against Hindu women of Sandeshkhali appears similar to a great extent to the path of sexual enslavement of women as practiced in Syria. This also perhaps explains why the Govt of West Bengal banned the The Kerala Story movie in West Bengal because they didn’t perhaps want oppressed women of West Bengal to associate themselves with those in Syria and realize what exactly was being done to them.
The savage criminals are not really expecting the sexually oppressed Hindus to still live there with such kind of humiliated, demoralised souls. They are rather expecting them to leave the place or convert & join their mission of changing West Bengal religious demography from within. The sole objective of such savagery seems to alter West Bengal religious demography & capture undivided Bengal as per the original agenda of the Muslim League before partition. This also explains the TMC-styled display of political murders in West Bengal. While during CPM regime they killed people and vanished the corpses in various ways so that people suddenly went untraceable, TMC reign displays the dead bodies by hanging them from trees, structural rods, electric towers etc. The sole objective appears to send the message of terror— whosoever would resist the demography-alterating techniques would be eliminated followed by showcasing such elimination for all, a predominant cause while a set of Hindu Bengalis of West Bengal remains silent on such atrocities. If the humiliated Hindus leave Sandeshkhali, infiltrators are waiting ready outside in Bangladesh, a few kilometres away from Sandeshkhali, to capture their places & properties. Sheikh Shahjahan & his aides won’t require even 24 hours to bring them in & gradually prepare their Indian documents like EPIC, PAN, Aadhaar & Passport etc. This appears to be the true objective behind all such mechanisms not only in Sandeshkhali but all along the West Bengal-Bangladesh border. The very first thing the Government of India needs to do is to stop enrolment of new aadhaar for anyone above 5 years of age in West Bengal. I expressed it in a mail to Hon’ble Dr. Manmohan Vaidya’Ji after he came to Kolkata in October 2018 and we met him in the Academy of Fine Arts.
A woman of Sandeshkhali said to media ANI that Papiya Sultana, a West Bengal cadre IPS of 2015 batch went to talk to them and asked them to disclose the identity of the victims & to submit medical report to substantiate their allegations.
The lady said the victims couldn’t dare to lodge specific complaints disclosing their identity out of social stigma as in that case the whole family including their children would have to suffer from social humiliation. So the ladies are suffering quietly sacrificing for their husbands, children and families. Moreover, how could they submit medical reports of incidents that happened 6 months back? The lady added. One more truth came out to light during the West Bengal post-poll violence 2021 i.e. the policemen of West Bengal were generally predisposed to act as the criminals’ hands. For example, Sheikh Shahjahan allegedly committed various crimes having the policemen accompanying him.
A proper complaint to the police by such ladies would also help the State Police to manipulate, based on the complaints, the cases in accordance to the loopholes of law in order to protect the rape criminals. Such apprehensions are not baseless as in the recent judgement of the Calcutta High Court, the perpetrators of the heinous Kamduni gang rape got either acquitted or relieved as the autopsy report presented to the High Court contained suitable manipulations that went in favour of the rapists. Such police actions yielded general trust deficit on police and administration which got fairly exposed even in front of the court of law in several occasions. Keeping such circumstances in mind it has to be noted that West Bengal Govt sent IPS Papiya Sultana to talk to the Hindu women of Sandeshkhali though there is no dearth of lady IPS officers of similar seniority level from non-Muslim communities. If an officer belonging to the minority community Hossain Mehdi Rehman has been chosen as the SP of Basirhat Police District because the population majority of Basirhat comprises the minorities (Muslims to be precise) then for the same reason a lady IPS of non-Muslim community should have been sent to talk to the women of Sandeshkhali especially when the allegation is predominantly against Shahjahan and his accomplices. In addition to that, some people are also claiming that the real name of Uttam Sardar is something else & he too is a Bangladeshi belonging to the minority community.
But the Govt of West Bengal sending Papiya Sultana to enquire the Hindu women may be apprehended as a sign of numerical muscle flexing by the minorities as the area’s religious demography has changed in favour of Muslims. It also fortifies the doubt that such police officers would strengthen the hands of the criminals & not of justice though even the non-Muslim front runner officers of GoWB too are not hesitating even the slightest to go against the community interests of the Hindus. By all means all such criminal approaches against women & corresponding police inaction appear to have aimed at a shift of religious demography in West Bengal.
On February 15, the West Bengal Police posted a video of a woman named Rekha Patra who was heard saying under strict vigilance of a policeman standing beside her that she went to the Judges’ Court with other Didis of her locality to record her statement in front of the magistrate. The video clearly exhibited how she was prompted on what to say by both the policeman and the accompanying Didis one of whom was in Hijab. Vivid sign of anxiety featured on the face of not only Rekha Patra but also the lady standing just beside her in police uniform. Shahjahan’s reign of terror was apparently being carried forward by the people in uniform in his apparent absence. However, how many of the uniformed men in different police stations of West Bengal are 1) policemen in reality, 2) truly from West Bengal in reality and 3) how many of them belong to the minority community are matters of probe as a good number of appointments has been given by the West Bengal Government to the minorities putting them in the OBC-A category depriving the Hindu OBCs of West Bengal.
To get a grasp of the Sandeshkhali incidents, the reader needs a prelude of the place along with a brief on Sheikh Shahjahan. It needs to be noted that Sandeshkhali’s peculiarity primarily lies in its geography that eventually turned the real reason behind the undue might of Sheikh Shahjahan. Khali = Khal = canal. It is a place located down south of the North 24 Parganas district on the Ganga Delta area where Maa Ganga falls into the Bay of Bengal and deposits all the silts she carried all the way from the Himalayas to the sea. Sandeshkhali, Jeliakhali, Naliakhali— all such Khalis are small pieces of lands made up of such deltaic silt and heavily supplied with numerous tiny distributaries of Maa Ganga as in the deltaic region the river divides and sub-divides into innumerable canals & creeks. With Bangladesh located in literally stone-throw distance, Bangladeshis and Rohingyas may come any moment sailing down the khalis, creeks and step into these places to share the resources of Bharat. Shahjahan is one who allegedly traffics such infiltrators in lieu of money.
Sandeshkhali is located in between the rivers Dansa and Kalindi, both distributaries of Maa Ganga. The reader may refer to the map to realize that along the river stream, the distance between Sandeshkhali & Khulna town is only around 300 meters with Sandeshkhali located on one side of river Dansa and Khulna town on the other. It has to be noted (in the map) that the official West Bengal-Bangladesh border at Khulna, the Radcliffe Line (the black line in the map), is around 6 kilometres away from Sandeshkhali, while a part of the Khulna town falls within West Bengal. This is the prime reason why Sandeshkhali turned into a point of infiltration and a problematic place. Khulna being present on both sides of Bangladesh border, Bangladeshis don’t hesitate to enter the West Bengal part of Khulna too. Adding to such confusions, Sandeshkhali rural health center is just very near to Khulna Gram Panchayat. Such geographical confusions gave birth to mafias like Shahjahan. Make no mistake, in absence of Shahjahan (if at all), it will hardly take any significant time for another mafia to crop up.
Bangladeshis enter at ease with Shahjahan’s trafficking and protection. They say, Shahjahan himself too is a Bangladeshi who once entered Sandeshkhali in the first decade of this century during CPM regime in the excuse of his ‘relationship’ with some Moslem Sheikh claiming Moslem to be his Mama while Moslem Sheikh was a CPM leader of Sandeshkhali at that time. Not sure whether Moslem was truly his Mama or the Mama of convenience for the purpose of infiltration. Nor sure whether Moslem too once infiltrated from Bangladesh during CPM rule or not.
Illegal Bangladeshis are ever-ready to enter Bharat sailing through the creeks and canals and Sandeshkhali & such other Khalis are places where they step in first just crossing the river Dansa or Kalindi. A large number of Janjatiya Hindus staying here too once came from Bangladesh fleeing religious persecution in the Islamic land. Shahjahan trafficks in the infiltrators for money which gradually turned him into the ‘protector of the realm’. He reportedly went to even Myanmar to bring in Rohingyas. It must be said that the infiltration industry of West Bengal was set up by none other than the CPM with whom Shahjahan started his criminal career. Before partition, CPM orchestrated with the Muslim League in their call for Pakistan and their demand of annexation of undivided Bengal to Pakistan.
So, once they came to power, the left front, took up the strategy to let Muslims too come in from Bangladesh along with the Hindus. While the Hindus came fleeing persecution, the Muslims came to increase the numerical dominance in West Bengal too for gradually altering the religious demography working up the original plan of the Muslim League to capture the undivided Bengal. The other objective was not to let Hindu Bengalis live peacefully in the Hindu Homeland of West Bengal. CPM retained the intention of turning Syamaprasad Mookerjee’s effort of securing a land for Hindu Bengalis futile. Before the amendments of The Indian Passport Act and the Indian Foreigners’ Act passed in September 2015, even the Hindu refugees from Bangladesh were ‘illegal infiltrators’ as per Indian law. Shahjahan, hence, built up his crime empire predominantly out of infiltrator-trafficking charges. He, gradually started dominating the complete area and allegedly engaged in various other smuggling businesses such as Fake Currency trafficking, gold and arms smuggling & various other border crimes. To dominate the locals, Shahjahan has allegedly settled Rohingyas there at some distance who arrive whenever necessary to terrorize people for some cause. Deep at night, boats sail around Sandeshkhali to terrorize the locals if they try to be disobedient to Shahjahan and his accomplices. Listening to the whispering air blowing over the streams of the delta, the locals get the signal that his army has come with their message. Such Shahjahan fled an ED raid on January 5, 2024 & attacked the ED officials with the help of the same brigade whom he used to terrorize locals. The veteran terrorist engaged in terrorism against the ED officials too. 113(1)(a)(i), 113(1)(B) read with 113(7) of Bharatiya Nyay Samhita clearly shows that Sheikh Shahjahan and his followers engaged in terrorism against ED officers. Therefore, a power-criminal of West Bengal had felt compelled to hide from his crime empire which helped the long-oppressed women to come out in protest of his debauchery and terrorism. To save West Bengal from ceaseless streams of infiltrators, Union Government needs to redraw Radcliffe Line for border readjustment with Bangladesh keeping the historically unfinished population exchange & the failed Nehru-Liyaqat Agreement in perspective.
In the press conference of February 14 organised by a civil society organization “Bongo Vivek”, a reporter of ABP Ananda asked Shri Vikram Sarkar whether Mamata Banerjee was a failed administrator or not. While Shri Sarkar said she had failed, I believe she could not succeed as she based totally on the West Bengal Government machinery to run not only her administration but her political ambitions too. Even in absence of Article 370, West Bengal demography was being steadily changed keeping herself in front and it appeared a bureaucrats’ game, a win-win deal between Mamata and a set of her officers who are the front runners in her administration as the design fulfilled her personal ambitions too. Given below please find are the questions right answers to which must be searched for in order to find out how true the allegations of Sandeshkhali ladies are.
What could be the sustainable reason(s) why in spite of countless allegations against Sheikh Shahjahan for so long, the State Police didn’t proceed against him?Is the Police afraid of Sheikh Shahjahan? Or they are the beneficiaries of the power criminal?
Several women alleged Shahjahan and his gang heckled them in front of the State Police. After 7 karyakartas of BJP were brutally murdered post 2019 Loksabha Election, their family members too raised similar allegations in front of the media that Shahjahan’s gang came along with the policemen of Nazat Police Station. Why did the police remain inactive in all such cases? And why did they accompany the criminals? The women added that the Police didn’t register FIRs based on their complaints against Shahjahan and his followers but sent them back to the accused persons themselves to settle the score. Did Shahjahan subjugate the local Police too? If so, then why is the top administration of West Bengal silent and inactive about it? Isn’t the higher-level collusion apparent?
Sandeshkhali women went on to an uprising after Sheikh Shahjahan went absconding but couldn’t protest the slightest as long as he was “on his chair”(as stated by women of Sandeshkhali to Bengal Governor CV Ananda Bose). Why were they so very much afraid of Shahjahan? Perhaps because Shahjahan came up with a team of ‘outsiders’ and arms and weapons like AK 47. Such allegations were raised both in 2019 as well as this time. From where did he procure such arms? Did the State Police investigate? Both Shahjahan’s sources of arms and State Police’ inaction against his reign of terror need NIA probe, I said in the press meet.
In the murder of 7 karyakartas of BJP post 2019 Loksabha Election result, Sheikh Shahjahan was an accused. Pradip Mondal was shot in one of his eyes. Dead bodies were put into sacks and placed under the muddy bed of the shallow fishing lakes of Sandeshkhali. This time too the police refused to register FIR against Shahjahan and Shahjahan went absconding. However, a month later, Sarberia Agarhati Gram Panchayat, of which Shiekh Shahjahan was the pradhan, received an award of being ‘the best child-friendly Panchayat of the State’ given by the Government of India by the recommendation of West Bengal Government. Such recommendations go from the topmost level of the State Government. Why did the GoWB topmost brass recommend a Gram Panchayat for an award whose Pradhan was accused of 7 brutal murders? And why did the Central Government not have their own intelligence sources to cross verify the correctness of the State’s recommendations? Sheikh Shahjahan reappeared in Sandeshkhali & talked to the media post receipt of the award but the Police of Nazat PS were too small fries to arrest him. As a result, he was effectively awarded for murdering 7 people of political opposition. This raised a question. What is the relationship between Sheikh Shahjahan and the topmost West Bengal officials?
At present, allegations are there against the same “child-friendly Panchayat” of grabbing the playgrounds of children, stopping football tournament there & forcing parents not to send children to school. Instead, Shahjahan and his accomplices allegedly asked people to let their boys work in Shahjahan ventures, no need to go to school or college. Did the State Police investigate such complaints?
Sheikh Shahjahan is accused of having links with terror organizations in Bangladesh & of facilitating illegal infiltrators like Rohingyas in India. Sandeshkhali women sloganeered “Bohiragoto dur hoto” (i.e. get out outsiders). The ‘outsiders’ with whom Shahjahan allegedly came to threaten women of Sandeshkhali were Rohingyas, they said. In spite of the Central Government’s warning directive on Rohingyas’ potential to pose security threats, Sheikh Shahjahan brings them in and the State Police claims they had no problems to accept them as the Rohingyas had UNHCR refugee cards. Rohingyas stated to the media in 2018 that they felt safe in West Bengal as they had the ‘protection of Shahjahan’. Why did the State Police let Shahjahan maintain such ‘larger than law’ image? Does Shahjahan bring in his arms consignments along with his Rohingya consignments? Did the State Police investigate? This requires NIA probe.
As per a viral video in the public domain, an officer of Chattisgarh Police, after capturing illegal immigrants, was apparently heard to state that the infiltrators’ Indian IDs were made in West Bengal. In fact, there’s a huge racket of making such Indian IDs in the State who make all sorts of Indian IDs in different places of West Bengal and has good connection with the Regional Passport Offices too. Could these run without the help of the State Administration?
Infiltration industry has a huge lucrative monetary value. What is the share of West Bengal Administration and the topmost brass thereof in it? The ‘Lion’s share’ goes to whom? What is the terms of Sheikh Shahjahan and West Bengal Administration with respect to such infiltration industry? It appears the industry runs with the help of a system of which Shiekh Shahjahan is only a front face. Getting right answers to all such questions would perhaps lead us to the truth behind the allegations of Sandeshkhali ladies. Union Government has responsibility to solve the Bengal problem before the State turns an irreparable loss.
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