A rally led by the Left peasant’s organisations in the city turned violent after the police stopped their ‘Nabanna Abhijaan’ – march to the state secretariat on Thursday. The Left supporters started brick-batting and pushed the guard rails against the police officers, leaving as many as 25-30 officers with serious injuries.
Several Left activists including CPI(M) Politburo member Biman Bose and 25 policemen were injured as Left Front supporters fought a pitched battle with the police when the cops tried to stop their march to the state secretariat. The Police resorted to lathicharge in Kolkata (rpt) in Kolkata, used water canons and lobbed teargas shells in Howrah (rpt) in Howrah to disperse the agitating Left Front activists.
Joint Commissioner of Police (Headquarters) Kolkata Police, Rajiv Mishra told reporters that 25 police officers including Special Commissioner-II and two Deputy Commissioners of Police were injured in the clashes and were admitted to different hospitals. "Left activists acted in a pre-planned manner as they carried stones and brickbats," Mishra said adding, 2,500 police personnel were deployed and they acted in a restrained manner.
To a question, he said the police were forced to resort to lathicharge to control the unruly crowd. Left Front chairman Biman Bose said he was injured and alleged that the police behaved as "volunteers of the Trinamool Congress."
"More than 110 LF activists are injured and admitted to hospitals. Many women activists too were injured in the police lathicharge. Old people were also not spared. We condemn this barbaric act by the police on a peaceful protest march," senior LF leader Manoj Bhattacharya said.
The CPI(M) affiliated All India Kisan Sabha (AIKS) along with ten other Left Front affiliated peasant fronts organised the march to the secretariat, Nabanna, in support of their 17-point charter of demands including issues such as farmer suicides and rehabilitation of farmers affected by the recent floods in the state.
Slamming the Leftists, senior Trinamool Congress leader and West Bengal minister Subrata Mukherjee said "It was nothing but hooliganism. We strongly condemn it. They attacked the police in a pre-planned way."
He claimed Biman Bose was injured in brickbats thrown by his own party men.
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