Kolkata: Ahead of the upcoming State Assembly elections, a BJP worker was shot at in West Bengal’s South 24-Parganas district on the morning of March 11. The victim, 66-year-old Trilokeswar Dhali, was reportedly attacked by two bike-borne assailants between the Sridham and Gangasagar bus stands, who opened fire before fleeing the scene.
Dhali sustained a bullet injury to his chest and collapsed on the road. Local residents rushed him to Sagar Rural Hospital, after which he was shifted to a hospital in Joka on the outskirts of Kolkata for further treatment. The West Bengal BJP has blamed the ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC) for the incident, while Dhali’s daughter has also suggested that members of the TMC could be involved in the attack on her father.
According to reports, Dhali previously served as the secretary of the Mathurapur organisational district committee of the Bharatiya Janata Party. In recent times, he had been working as a party worker. Condemning the attack, BJP leader Jagannath Chattopadhyay said the party would lodge a complaint with the Election Commission of India, demanding strict action against the officer-in-charge of the local police station.
“He is in a critical condition. We will bring this case to the EC’s notice. Action should be taken against the officer-in-charge of the police station. Unless the EC takes action, the police will continue to play a partisan role,” Chattopadhyay said.
“There is no rule of law in Bengal. In the last few years, leaders and workers from the SC and ST communities have been killed in Bengal,” said Samik Bhattacharya, the Bengal BJP president and Rajya Sabha MP.
Notably, the Union Ministry of Home Affairs has deployed 480 companies of central armed forces in the state ahead of the Assembly elections, the dates for which are yet to be announced.
