The Trinamool-run Cooch Behar municipality on Monday performed a ritual to mark the upcoming installation of the statue of Maharaja Jagaddipendranarayan, the last king of the erstwhile princely state of Cooch Behar.
The event occurred within 48 hours of chief minister Mamata Banerjee intervening to end an impasse between the local civic body and the north Bengal development department.
Civic chairman Rabindranath Ghosh took part in the "bhoomi puja” at Amtala on the bank of the Sagardighi in the heart of the town. He was accompanied by descendants of the royal family, NBSTC chairman and former MP Partha Pratim Roy and Trinamool’s district chief Avijit De Bhowmik. Minister Udayan Guha, however, stayed away.
“The Maharaja’s statue, which will have a height of seven feet and two inches, will be installed at the site soon. Today (Monday), we performed the puja at the site finalised by the municipality,” civic chairman Ghosh said.
Last week, as the municipality engaged workers to clean the site, which happens to be near the north Bengal development department’s office, some employees of the department headed by minister Guha stopped the work. Guha is known for his differences with Ghosh.
With the factionalism in Cooch Behar Trinamool embarrassingly visible, on Saturday, chief minister Mamata Banerjee spoke to Guha, who in turn assured her that there would be no problem over the installation of the statue henceforth.
Accordingly, Ghosh and the civic body acted swiftly to prepare for Monday's event.
The puja was performed at the same site on Monday without any glitch.
It was assumed that Mamata had succeeded in stitching the factionalism in her party's Cooch Behar unit, as Guha and Ghosh are two of the most prominent Trinamool faces in the district.
Minister Guha's absence at Monday's event was noticed by political watchers. However, he said: “I have assured the chief minister that the statue will be installed and we will extend all necessary cooperation.”
Encroachment charge
Udayan Guha was drawn into a fresh controversy over the installation of his father Kamal Guha's statues at Dinhata. The senior Guha, who died in 2007, had been a Bengal minister during the Left Front regime and an All India Forward Bloc leader.
On Monday, a group of residents of Dinhata, led by social worker Anwar Hossain, submitted a letter at the district magistrate’s office, alleging that three statues of Kamal Guha were already installed on government land and the fourth was underway near the sub-divisional court of Dinahata.
The letter did not name Udayan, but clearly indicated his "influence" in the "encroachment" of government land. “We have requested the district magistrate to probe the case and take appropriate legal steps. Such encroachment is a blatant violation of the law,” said Hossain.
Contacted, the minister denied these charges.
“The land where the memorial of Kamal Guha has been developed is registered in the name of Hemanta Basu Corner (an organisation formed after a Forward Bloc leader),” he said.