Villagers tie CRPF jawan to tree after alleged assault on minor in Hooghly

Tension gripped Bandipur village in the Haripal Assembly constituency of Hooghly district on Friday night after a jawan from the Central Forces was accused of molesting a minor girl. According to local accounts, the incident occurred under the cover of darkness while the girl, a local resident, was returning home from her tuition classes. It is alleged that the jawan intercepted her, grabbed her hand, and attempted to forcefully pull her toward a deserted area.

The situation escalated quickly when local residents, alerted by the commotion, caught the jawan red-handed. In an outburst of public anger, the villagers detained the personnel and tied him to a tree, where they staged a vocal protest. Upon receiving news of the incident, Karabi Manna, the Trinamool Congress (TMC) candidate for the Haripal constituency, arrived at the scene with a large group of followers to support the victim’s family and demand immediate legal action against the accused.

The protest shifted to the Haripal Police Station, where Manna and her supporters held a sit-in demonstration. They demanded the formal arrest and strict punishment of the jawan, surrounding a police vehicle during the process. While the police eventually managed to rescue the jawan from the mob to bring the situation under control, the local community remained agitated, surrounding the police van and chanting slogans against the central forces' presence in the area.

Speaking on the matter, Karabi Manna expressed strong indignation, stating, "Those who are responsible for providing security cannot be allowed to come to Bengal and torture the daughters of Bengal. We definitely want punishment for the CRPF jawan." Despite the gravity of the accusations and the witness accounts from the villagers, the accused jawan has reportedly denied all allegations of misconduct.

This incident has reignited concerns regarding the conduct of central security personnel in the region, drawing parallels to a recent case in Kulti’s Shitalpur Lalbazar area. In that previous instance, a CISF jawan named Ramakant Vishwakarma was arrested for allegedly luring a 10-year-old girl to his quarters under the pretext of giving her mangoes and subsequently assaulting her. The recurring nature of such allegations has led to widespread political and social unrest across the district.