By IANS
Kolkata : West Bengal was paralysed again Wednesday by a shut-down enforced by the ruling Left Front constituent Forward Bloc to protest police firing on its supporters that left six people dead.
While All India Forward Bloc (AIFB), the second largest constituent of the Left Front government, termed the firing “second Nandigram”, West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, now in New Delhi to fginalise the state’s annual plan, ordered a magisterial inquiry into the incident.
The AIFB called off the shutdown at 6 p.m., despite its 24-hour closure call, train and bus services were affected and sporadic violence led to over 1,200 arrests.
The shutdown evoked partial to near-total response varying from district to district, but Cooch-Behar district was severely affected by the shutdown.
The toll in the police firing on the activists of the Forward Bloc Tuesday in Cooch-Behar district’s Dinhata town, about 800 km from here, rose to six with the death of a police officer.
“A National Volunteer Force (NVF) personnel died late Tuesday night, taking the toll to six,” said Inspector General of Police (North Bengal) R.J.S. Nawla. “The situation in Cooch Behar is peaceful,” Nawla told IANS.
“Two more are battling for life and they can succumb any time,” AIFB general secretary Ashok Ghosh said here.
The shutdown, which began at 6 a.m., affected train and bus services in Kolkata as party supporters blocked roads and railway tracks in many places in the city and the state.
“The overall law and order situation was peaceful except for some road blockades and rallies. State-wide 1,200 people were arrested, including 258 in Kolkata,” West Bengal Inspector General (Law and Order) Raj Kanokia told IANS.
Sporadic clashes took place between Forward Bloc supporters and the police at busy crossings like Central Avenue-B.B Ganguly Street, Central Avenue-Ganesh Chandra Avenue, Esplanade and Canning Street in Kolkata, Kolkata police commissioner Gautam Mohan Chakraborty told IANS.
Buses were plying, although fewer in number, but there were hardly any passengers as people were scared to venture out. The city’s metro also saw few commuters.
“The rail service is badly affected. Train services in Howrah division were disrupted while in Sealdah division it was partially disrupted,” said Samir Goswami, Eastern Railway spokesperson.
“We have cancelled 17 trains from Howrah. The strike supporters also blocked railway tracks in Malda division,” he said.
Netaji Shubhash Chandra Bose International (NSCBI) airport director V.K. Monga said air services remained unaffected and no flights were cancelled.
West Bengal’s burgeoning IT sector was not hit by the call for shutdown.
“The attendance is almost like any other day. The sector has not been affected much since we made all arrangements to facilitate transportation of IT workers,” said West Bengal IT Secretary Siddharth.
In the state secretariat, Writers’ Buildings, here the turnout was 40 percent, a Communist Party of India-Marxist ((CPI-M) leader informed.
But the shutdown, supported by the Trinamool Congress, Socialist Unity Centre of India (SUCI) and Congress, was total in Cooch Behar district.
At least seven police complaints were lodged against Forward Bloc members, including Cooch Behar unit secretary Udayan Guha, for leading Tuesday’s protest that turned violent.
Clashes were also reported from places like Barasat and Madhyamgram near Kolkata besides Asansol in Burdwan district and areas of Hooghly district.
Forward Bloc leader and West Bengal Cooperative Minister Rabindra Nath Ghosh staged a road blockade on the Kona Expressway in Howrah with his supporters. Legislator Niranjan Pandit was arrested for staging a demonstration.
At a press conference Wednesday evening, Ashok Ghosh said the shutdown was one of the most spontaneous ever and Left Front should take lessons and mend its ways.
“A government cannot be run by trigger happy police. The question is now whether a government can stay in power by use of brute police force. Dinhata is like ‘second Nandigram’. We are still clueless why Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) were deployed Tuesday to control the protestors,” Ghosh said.
Ghosh also announced compensation of Rs.300,000 for each family of the deceased party workers and pledged to take full responsibilities of the “martyrs'” dependants.
The Forward Bloc had organised a statewide protest Tuesday, demanding minimum 100 days’ employment for the jobless, BPL (Below Poverty Line) cards for the poor, cancellation of special economic zones (SEZs) policy to secure farmers’ land rights and job quotas for Muslims.
The firing on a constituent of the ruling Left is unprecedented in the over three decades of rule of the communists.
While the total strength of Left Front in the West Bengal assembly is 235, the CPI-M alone accounts for 176 seats. AIFB is the second largest Front partner with 23 seats. Revolutionary Socialist Party (RSP) and Communist Party of India (CPI) have 20 and eight seats respectively.
AIFB and RSP were at loggerheads against their big partner CPI-M over issues like industrialisation on farmlands, big houses’ entry into retail sector and host of other issues.