Adhir blasts TMC for 'wrongful' arrest of Sagardighi candidate, writes to EC

Congress leader in the Lok Sabha and the party’s West Bengal unit chief Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury on Thursday accused the Trinamool Congress government in the state of trying to falsely implicate the Congress candidate and a local leader ahead of the February 27 Sagardighi assembly bypoll and wrote to the Election Commission of India (ECI) seeking its immediate attention in the matter.

The West Bengal police on February 17 arrested Sagardighi Congress block leader Saidur Rahman in a rape case and the Calcutta high court granted him interim bail on Wednesday with Chowdhury signing the surety bond for him. Saidul’s wife Shahnaz Bibi had moved the high court against his arrest, stating that he was arrested without a preliminary investigation.

Chowdhury, in his letter to Chief Election Commissioner, Rajiv Kumar, alleged that the state police was also trying to lodge a false and “politically driven” case against Congress bypoll candidate Bairan Biswas.

“It is very unfortunate that the entire Police System in Bengal is working as the most powerful instrument in favour of the ruling party with an objective to dismantle and ruin the opposition parties in an undemocratic, unfair and illegal way,” Chowdhury said in the letter.