Calcutta: A section of the "culture clan" that made its presence felt during Mamata Banerjee's Singur-Nandigram movements has expressed alarm over "anarchy" linked to the rural polls.

"Miscreants have taken control of the nomination process and we wonder what we have to witness when it is time for the actual polls or the results. The state seems to have no control over the anarchy, which is crossing limits daily.... Dark days lie ahead if the citizens lose their constitutional rights," said thespian Bibhas Chakraborty.

Chakraborty and singers Pratul Mukhopadhyay and Pallab Kirtaniya addressed a news conference convened by a "Forum of Artistes, Cultural Activists and Intellectuals". Academician Miratun Nahar and former advocate-general Bimal Chatterjee also attended the event.

"When a ruler becomes a dictator, it is dangerous for the masses as well as the rulers," said Mukhopadhyay. "As members of the civil society, we were vocal about the earlier regime and demanded change. We should once again come out in the open and lodge our protests against the current rulers, without showing any bias or taking sides to please them."

Later in the day, the chief minister said she respected the views expressed but attributed a political motive. "You should run a check, they had come in the car of former SUCI MP Tarun Mondal," she said. The forum has SUCI leanings but the party was a key component of Mamata's anti-land acquisition forum, too.

Former advocate-general Chatterjee, who was not part of the culture clan, said that unleashing of violence to ensure a "walkover" in the rural polls was an attempt to incapacitate democracy.

"I had to go against my will and conscience to defend this state government in court on a number of occasions as the advocate-general of the state," said barrister Chatterjee, who resigned from the post in December 2014.

Trinamul secretary-general Partha Chatterjee said: "I would want to know directly from them why they have said these things and on what basis. We would want to know from them if the government, indeed, was at fault."

He added: "I think they have been misguided by exaggerated and untrue accounts in the media, besides the misleading public statements and activities of the Opposition."