Cooch Behar, July 13: The Forward Bloc today suspended the local committee secretary of Gopalpur in the Mathabhanga subdivision after a married woman had accused him of sexually using her and then running away.

Chitramohan Barman, who was relieved of the party post, and his brother fled their home when the woman began a dharna in front of their house after being turned away by her husband.

“I have been sitting outside their house for three days and I am not being allowed inside by Chitramohan’s relatives. He had been sexually exploiting me and even promised to marry me if I divorced my husband. Now that my husband has abandoned me, Chitramohan should accept me. If he doesn’t, I have no other option but to kill myself,” said the woman.

The scandal, which has sent ripples across the Bloc rank and file, made the party’s minister Paresh Adhikary visit the area and enquire about the incident.

Bloc district secretary Udayan Guha, who convened a press conference, said Chitramohan had been “ousted from the party temporarily”. “We have formed a three-member inquiry committee and a final decision will be taken after it submits its report,” Guha said.

The woman’s husband works in Bangalore and she, along with her minor son and daughter, was staying with her in-laws. She said Chitramohan used her loneliness to get physically intimate with her.

When her husband had recently returned from Bangalore, the woman said, he got to know about her relationship with Chitramohan. “He started torturing me and asked me to leave the house. The villagers also kept away from me.”

The woman said she had told Chitramohan about her predicament. “It was then that Chitramohan, a bachelor, told me that he would solve the problem by marrying me, but he has now fled the scene.”

Shunted out of her house and shunned by the neighbours, the woman has been sitting in front of Chitramohan’s house since Thursday. The Bloc leaders of the area failed to make her budge from the spot. It was only last night that the woman was given shelter in the house of one of Chitramohan’s neighbours.

As the male members have left Chitramohan’s place, his sister-in-law, Arati, said the woman was trying to blackmail her brother-in-law.

Guha said the incident could be an attempt to tarnish the image of the party. “We are not taking this lightly.”