Cooch Behar, Dec. 5: A blame game has erupted between the district administration and the Border Security Force (BSF) over the assault of two senior officers of Mathabhanga on Friday.
Enraged at having been asked to part with several idols they found while constructing a culvert, the residents allegedly assaulted subdivisional officer Amiya Biswas and subdivisional police officer Subrata Ganguly and damaged their vehicles. The two officials had gone to Mahischaru village to recover the idols which had been found on November 27.
The simmering tension between came to the fore today when the deputy inspector-general of the BSF?s Cooch Behar sector, Vimal Mohan, called a news conference and squarely blamed the district officials for Friday?s violence.
The immediate provocation for the drastic action appears to be the FIR lodged by the block development officer of Mathabhanga I, Chiranjib Ghosh, naming 23 people for the assault of the two officers. Included in the list are Prabin Biswas and Subhas Chandra, two jawans of the BSF.
In the FIR, Ghosh complained that the two jawans had allegedly threatened the drivers of the vehicles of the SDO and SDPO not to leave the spot with the seized idols. This apparently emboldened the villagers into attacking the two officers.
Refuting the charges, BSF commandant D.K. Tripathi issued a press release, which states that on December 3, the SDPO called Naresh Lakra, the company commander of the Baragaria BSF outpost, saying he and the SDO would come to Mahischaru to collect the four idols.
?The company commander had very categorically conveyed (to the SDPO) that he would not be able to provide more than four BSF personnel since the operation has been planned without the consent of the company commander,? says the release.
Tripathi said the company commander had sent four jawans to the spot. When Lakra was on his way to the spot, he found the villagers had set up obstructions and he was forced to abandon his vehicle and proceed to the village on foot.
Cooch Behar district magistrate Ravi Inder Singh said: ?An FIR has been filed and investigations are on.?
