HC asks govt to explain Nandigram

KOLKATA: The Calcutta HC on Friday directed the West Bengal government to file an affidavit within eight weeks giving its views on the law and order situation in Nandigram during the alleged CPI(M) recapture of Nandigram in November 2007.

A division bench of the Calcutta High Court, comprising Chief Justice SS Nijjar and Justice Pinaki Chandra Ghosh, gave this direction while hearing a public interest litigation (PIL) filed earlier demanding enquiry by Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on the violence during that period.

However, during the hearing the state advocate-general Balai Roy claimed that CBI had no role to play in the matter since the law and order problem arising out of clashes between two groups was entirely a state subject.

He also claimed that since no fresh violence was recorded after November 11, 2007 and with the state police having registered over 260 cases in the matter, the PIL was no longer maintainable.

However, senior advocate and Trinamool Congress leader Kalyan Banerjee, who filed the PIL, claimed that only a CBI enquiry can reveal the truth behind the violence since the state government had deliberately withdrawn the police from Nandigram so that the CPI(M) activists could enter without resistance and conduct armed action there.

r_sumanta@dnaindia.net