DENTIST ACCUSES TRINAMUL COUNCILLOR OF DEMANDING RS 60,000

A dentist and his wife were brutally attacked in front of their nine-year-old daughter on Sunday evening, the assault allegedly masterminded by a Trinamul councillor for his refusal to pay a "local development fee" of Rs 60,000.

Prasenjit Biswas had his lower jaw and nasal bone fractured for his defiance. He also suffered a deep cut in his right calf and had bruises all over his body. Wife Champa landed in hospital with a clot in her brain, haemorrhage in both eyes and a fractured left maxillary sinus, the bone below the left eye.

The couple had been attacked with iron rods and sticks after they stepped out of their home in Sonarpur, on the city's southern fringe, around 8.30pm to go to the nearby market. Their daughter ran crying into a neighbour's house on seeing her parents being assaulted by seven to eight men.

According to the police complaint lodged by the dentist, Bibhas Mukherjee, councillor of Ward 4 of Rajpur-Sonarpur Municipality, had allegedly asked him to pay Rs 60,000 for "local development" on several occasions and he had refused to do so each time.

Councillor Mukherjee contested the twin allegations - demanding money and ordering the attack on being rebuffed by the dentist. "I don't believe in collecting money from the common people by using my position in the party. At the time of the alleged assault, I was at another place around 5km away from where it took place," he said.

An unnamed woman had turned up at Sonarpur police station to accuse dentist Biswas of molesting her before the police received his complaint against the councillor. The police station registered separate cases on the basis of the two complaints. "We are probing both cases," said Sunil Choudhury, superintendent of police, South 24-Parganas.

Mukherjee said the assault on the dentist and his wife may have been triggered by the allegation that he had molested a woman. "The dentist was possibly beaten up by local people who were angry about what he had done to the woman."

Biswas, who is undergoing treatment at Calcutta Medical College and Hospital, accused the councillor of getting a woman to lodge a false complaint against him to cover up his alleged involvement in the attack.

The dentist said he had first heard from Mukherjee around the time he started building a house in Sonarpur a year and a half ago. He accused the councillor of directly asking for money, saying it was for "development of the area". When he didn't comply, Mukherjee allegedly sent his supporters to intimidate him on several occasions.

Biswas did not buckle under pressure and lodged a complaint with the police last year when Mukherjee allegedly threatened to evict him from his house. The police arrested five men on the basis of the complaint but the demand for money didn't stop.

"The accused are currently on bail and the case is pending in court," said an officer at Sonarpur police station.

Biswas's plight is the same as countless others who have had close encounters of the extortion kind with Bengal's infamous syndicates.

Syndicate is a euphemism for extortion rackets that employ an army of unemployed youths to arm-twist the construction business. In areas still untouched by the realty boom, even someone building a small house with a bank loan or one's life's savings is a potential target.

The demand for money is often in the garb of a "development fee" or a request for a donation to a local cause such as beautification of the neighbourhood park, a proposal to buy a table tennis board for a club or a multi-gym project, among others.

Leaders of the ruling party make such demands mainly to feed the party's unemployed cadres, although their leader Mamata Banerjee has publicly voiced her disapproval of this practice. A Trinamul circular issued in August last year said: "To be noted specifically, no leader or worker can be involved directly or indirectly with brick-kilns, bheris (fisheries), syndicates and land dealings."

The menace is still widespread.

Councillors were earlier known to allow illegal constructions in return for hefty bribes. Now, even for internal work for which no permission is required from the Calcutta Municipal Corporation, there are allegations of councillors sending their men to demand money. "If someone is replacing old tiles, someone will approach the household and tell the owner to buy tiles from a particular shop. If not, they will ask for some money," said an engineer in the building department of the CMC.

In central Calcutta few years ago, a former mayoral council member's husband had allegedly stopped a house owner from renovating the interior of his building because he refused to pay him. In north Calcutta, a gang claiming to owe allegiance to a mayoral council member had demanded Rs 80,000 from a person returning to his apartment after a gap of 10 years.

Lying on a mattress on the floor of a CMCH ward, dentist Biswas on Monday recounted the attack that he never imagined could happen to him.

"I had walked barely 100 metres from my house when a gang of seven to eight men, armed with iron rods and lathis, surrounded me. The first blow was to my jaw. I saw my wife Champa being hit and fall as well. She was beaten up mercilessly just as I was," he said.

His daughter, a student of Class III in a south Calcutta school, sat silently beside him as he narrated his ordeal.

Biswas and his family had moved to Sonarpur from a rented house in Garia last year.

Mayor Sovan Chatterjee, who is also the president of Trinamul's South 24-Parganas unit, said that if anyone had demanded money from Biswas, it wouldn't be condoned.

"If he (Biswas) has any complaint against anyone, he can initiate all lawful measures against the accused," he said when Metro contacted him on Monday.

During the just-concluded Assembly session, Rajarhat-New Town MLA Sabyasachi Dutta had admitted that there were syndicates in New Town.