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Eighteen Trinamul activists
killed in Garbeta

Eighteen Trinamul Congress supporters were reportedly killed in Garbeta in Midnapore district of West Bengal allegedly by armed men owing allegiance to the Communist Party of India-Marxist late on Thursday night.

Incidentally, the massacre has coincided with the Trinamul call for a Bengal bandh in protest against the attack on its workers and that on Union Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee on Wednesday evening in Keshpur.

Talking to rediff.com, Trinamul's Policy Making Cell chairman Pankaj Banerjee said that the CPI-M 'hoodlums' attacked the house of Abdul Ghani in Chosongudia village when everybody was asleep. The latter is a Trinamul activist.

The assailants, Banerjee added, set the house on fire before hacking four minors who attempted to flee out of the burning house to death.

"The killer mob stood at all the entry points of the house to ensure no one could escape the engulfing inferno," Banerjee said.

"Eleven bodies have so far been identified while we have yet to establish the identity of seven others. Three charred bodies are still lying inside the gutted house in unidentifiable condition," Banerjee said.

"The bodies identified are those of Mukhtar Khan (20), Haidar Khan (30), Rafique Mallick (36), Rabiul Bhang (28), Ima Haque Mondal (25), Inamul (18), Kajal (age not known), Sen Patra (19), Amal Mallick (18), Unmed (20) and Sattar (22)," Banerjee informed.

"Abdul Ghani is a known Trinamul activist in Garbeta. CPI-M cadres were after his life ever since Left Front nominee Gurudas Dasgupta lost to Bikram Sarkar in the Panskura parliamentary by-election last year," Banerjee said.

According to him, many Trinamul workers had taken shelter in Ghani's house, which also functioned as a party office in Garbeta.

Banerjee said the Trinamul had not yet decided on calling another bandh in the wake of the recent killings. He said that the party would take stock of the situation on Friday evening in consultation with Mamata.

Meanwhile, a Trinamul delegation comprising Banerjee and other party legislators would be leaving for the massacre site on Friday evening to review the situation.

The West Bengal DGP's control room, however, confirmed the death of only two people.

When contacted, Inspector General of Police (Law and Order) Prasun Mukherjee told rediff.com that he had sent his officers to the troubled village.

He added that the house that unidentified assailants attacked belonged to Abdul Rahman, not Abdul Ghani as claimed by Trinamul leaders.

"We have ordered a combing operation to nab the culprits. I do not have any report of casualties as yet. I am waiting for my officers' findings," Mukherjee added.

Meanwhile, the Trinamul sponsored bandh has crippled life in Calcutta and elsewhere in Bengal with sporadic incidents of violence being reported throughout the state.

Streets and Calcutta were on Friday converted to cricket grounds while government owned buses and trams plied empty. There was a minor incident of violence in Shyambazar in north Calcutta in the afternoon when some Trinamul workers tried to shut down shops forcibly.

However, the Calcutta Armed Police arrived on time to restore order.

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