Black ink thrown at Jawaharlal Nehru statue; TMC, BJP blame each other

Dismissing the allegation, a local BJP member, pleading anonymity, told The Sunday Express that TMC has no work but to blame the BJP for everything. “We have no connection with the incident. Let police find out who did it,” said the member.

Describing the incident as “ridiculous”, a local police officer said, “This statue is a landmark in the area and has been there for the last 12 years. People playing politics over statues is ridiculous. It is wastage of time and resources for police as well.” Meanwhile, local Congress workers held a demonstration in front of the police station, demanding immediate arrest of those responsible for the act.

Katwa Town Congress secretary Subhashish Samanta has alleged that BJP workers were behind the incident, while the saffron party’s rural district secretary Sandip Nandy has said the party had no role in it. The incident comes amid reports of several statue vandalisations in other parts of the country. It all began with the pulling down of Lenin’s statue in Tripura allegedly by BJP workers. In a reaction to the incident, a bust of Jan Sangh founder Syama Prasad Mookerjee was defaced and blackened by alleged members of a Leftist group named ‘Radicals’ of Jadavpur University in Kolkata.

With inputs from PTI