Calcutta, July 20: The government today said preliminary reports did not suggest lapses on the part of police during last week’s attack on Congress MLAs in Mangalkot.

“Preliminary reports we have got... do not indicate or suggest that there were police lapses. However, we will have to examine the matter in greater detail,” home secretary Ardhendu Sen said.

He was speaking on the basis of a preliminary probe conducted by DIG (Burdwan range) Jagmohan.

Sen, who met chief minis- ter Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee before he addressed reporters, appeared to suggest things could have gone out of hand had the police tried to protect the MLAs. “The problem is that the area where the trouble occurred isn’t suitable for police action because of the density of population. The place is very small and congested.”

Nine Congress MLAs, who went to Dhanyarukhi village in Mangalkot on Wednesday to distribute relief among party workers hit by clashes with the CPM, were chased across paddy fields and stoned as the police looked on.

Local MLA Rabindranath Chatterjee, who needed eight stitches on his head, has filed an FIR but only one of the eight people named in it has been arrested.

A Congress supporter’s house in the village was torched yesterday barely 200 metres from a police camp.

After a meeting with Burdwan district magistrate Rajesh Sinha and police chief R. Rajsekharan, Sen suggested “restrictions” on those going to Mangalkot.

“Many organisations want to go there with relief. But they should inform the administration before going. Otherwise, we’d be helpless if something happens. If the administration knows about a visit, it can impose restrictions like the route to be taken and the number of people to be allowed.”