Police on Thursday said they had not yet received the arrest warrant against poet Srijato Bandyopadhyay, which a court in Nadia issued on Wednesday.
The warrant directed the inspector-in-charge of Golf Green police station to arrest Srijato and produce him before the court of the additional chief judicial magistrate in Krishnanagar, Nadia, on June 11, 2026.
On Thursday, Srijato told Metro that he had yet to get any communication from the police.
Sources said sometimes it takes days, weeks or even months for an arrest warrant to reach a police station from the court if the two are in different districts.
“If a warrant is served within the same district, the process is usually quicker. In inter-district cases, it has to be sent by post. How quickly it is sent often depends on the priority given to the case,” said a lawyer not associated with the case.
If the police consider the matter a priority, officers may sometimes visit the court to collect the arrest warrant, reducing delays.
It was not clear till Thursday evening whether the warrant had been dispatched from Nadia.
The warrant issued is in connection with a 2019 case relating to a poem Srijato wrote in 2017. The timing of the warrant — on the eve of Phase 1 of the elections — raised suspicion among many.
A popular contemporary Bengali poet, Srijato won the Ananda Puraskar in 2004 for his book of poems Uranta Sob Joker, has also written novels, songs and even acted in a film.
Asked what led to the warrant, he said on Wednesday that it was related to an FIR lodged against him by an individual in connection with a poem he wrote in 2017.
“I have around 22-24 cases against me. It is difficult for me to track each of those,” the poet said.
He said that although he had been told multiple summonses had been sent, he never received any, and the alleged non-receipt was now being construed as refusal to accept them — leading to the issuance of the warrant.