Arabinda Dhar

CPM activist Arabinda Dhar who was shot by a Tripura policeman on Sunday for allegedly trying to muscle his way into a booth died early on Tuesday, prompting Bengal’s political arch-rivals to intensify their war of words.

The CPM was the first to hit town on the issue during the day, with cadres in Dhar’s locality in Patuli putting up posters blaming Trinamul for provoking the cop to open fire. The posters, however, were pulled down following orders from senior leaders.

Mamata Banerjee, who had dubbed Dhar, alias Bapi, a “notorious criminal” on Monday, did not repeat the charge the day he died, but kept up her tirade and blamed the CPM’s “infighting” for the incident.

“You better ask the chief minister because the ward where Dhar was shot is in his Assembly constituency (Jadavpur),” the Trinamul chief said in Delhi when asked what had led to the firing.

“It was the chief minister who had allowed his harmad bahini (armed goons) to loot electronic voting machines and rig the polls. They even wanted to kill policemen on duty…. The policeman who had fired was from Tripura. Are we in power in Tripura? Are we in power in Bengal? We had nothing to do with the incident,” she said.

The Trinamul secretary-general and the leader of the Opposition in the Assembly, Partha Chatterjee, later held a press conference at Mamata’s house and repeated the party’s stand without even once condoling the poll-day death.

Mamata also expressed “surprise” over the death of a man who had been shot in the leg. Her doubts may have been clarified by the Peerless Hospital superintendent Sudipta Mitra, who said “huge blood loss leading to prolonged oxygen deficiency in the brain and kidney” was responsible for Dhar’s death.

“Nearly three inches of the artery that carries blood to the part of the leg below the knee was cut off. His haemoglobin count was 2.8 against the normal 14 for a man of his age and build,” said Mitra.

Arabinda Dhar’s son Mayukh. (Sanjoy Chattopadhyaya)

The CPM, which turned up in numbers at the Alimuddin Street headquarters to mourn the “popular party worker and social activist”, rubbished Mamata’s claim that Dhar had been involved in rigging. The CPM’s claim was echoed by a senior police officer.

“He was the party’s polling agent at an adjoining booth and had gone there (Kendua Mahendranath Girls’ High School) to cast his vote almost at the end of the polling process. The firing was unprovoked. There was no evidence of chaos at the polling station,” CPM state secretary Biman Bose said.

Bose and other CPM leaders slammed Mamata for indulging in “ghrinnya rajniti” (deplorable politics) and called her an “irresponsible hothead with a perverse taste (bikrita ruchi) and an unstable mind”.

Dhara’s father Bhuban Chandra Dhar has lodged an FIR against Sandip Sharma, the Tripura cop who had pulled the trigger.

The director-general of police, Bhupinder Singh, said a case under IPC Section 326 (voluntarily causing grievous hurt by dangerous weapons or means) had been started against Sharma on the basis of the complaint. “Sharma can be arrested under Section 326. Moreover, since Dhara is dead the section will be changed....The SP’s report reveals that the situation did not warrant firing.”

The inspector-general of police (law and order), Surajit Kar Purakayastha, said no criminal cases were pending against the victim. “Dhara had not violated any rule on the poll day. The Tripura police have sent us a report and we are going through it.”

While the CPM and the police were speaking in one voice on Dhar’s role on Sunday, RSP leader and minister Kshiti Goswami struck a discordant note, saying: “It should be found out whether Dhar had crossed any limit or whether the jawan had warned him before shooting him in the leg.”

CPM activists denied Trinamul leader Chatterjee’s charge that Dhar was left lying in a pool of blood for four hours. “Dhara was shot around 2.45. Minutes later, local cops came and took Dhara to Peerless Hospital,” said Sushanta Naskar, a witness.

The hospital authorities said Dhar had been admitted at 3.07pm. Sources said the chief minister had arranged for some “renowned doctors” not attached to Peerless, such as Sukumar Mukherjee, to treat Dhar.