There are three news items on the provocative raid by Jadavpur PS in Jadavpur constituency - home constituency of W Bengal chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee who looks after police matters too. I maintain that this plan has the nod from the CM. Today when the five girls and activists of Martangini Mahila Samiti went to the police to lodge an FIR, naming the police officers and staff who wanted to search their residence without search warrant, the FIR was refused on the plea that the officer-in-charge was out of office. Sometime thereafter, the dy supdt of police, superior officer, came who too did not receive the FIR. Under which law?
The news hereunder has reference to People's March which is not banned but treated by the police as a material , the possession of which is illegal.
Is this a democratic regime?
SR
Police, CPM workers search rented house of JU students for Maoist links ENS 8Jun 08 (http://www.expressindia.com/latest-news/Police-CPM-workers-search-rented-house-of-JU-students-for-Maoist-links/320125/)
Kolkata, June 7 For over four hours, five woman students of the Jadavpur University faced a harrowing time as police and local CPM workers searched their rented accommodation in Palbazar alleging that the girls were linked to Maoists. Police also claimed that they have found some "incriminating documents" from their house.
Inspector General of Police (Law and Order), Raj Kanojia, had said a few days ago that the police had found some Maoist posters in the area. "We had information that there might be some more documents in the house. So, we searched the house after getting a warrant," Kanojia said.
The girls, however, had a different story to tell.
According to Debolina Chakraborty, one of the five students, the heavy downpour on Friday had soaked some of their belongings, which is why they had kept them to dry in the sun today morning. Articles like books and a few editions of the People's March, a monthly magazine allegedly published by the Communist Party of India (Maoist) had also been kept out for drying.
She alleged that around 10 am, some local people, known to be CPM supporters, began making a ruckus alleging that these students had links with Maoists. This was followed by the visit of a group of policemen in plain clothes. The police demanded that the students, who by then had locked the doors, let them search their house. The
students declined and demanded to see the search
warrant.
The policemen from Jadavpur police station, however, were unable to produce any warrant. Later, senior police officers of South 24 Parganas, including Deputy Superintendent of Police (Town) Mehmood Akhtar, returned with a search warrant.
The drama continued for over four hours. Activists from the Bandi Mukti Committe, Association for Protection of Democratic Rights and social worker Anuradha Putotundo also arrived at the spot. Students from Jadavpur University also began gathering in large numbers. Sources in the police said that after consulting senior officers they decided to call off the search. Throughout the day, the police remained tight-lipped about the entire incident.
The five students are Debolina Chakraborty, Joyeeta Das, Pooja Basu, Anwesha Sarkar and Somdatta. They all have a very good academic record. While
Debolina and Jayeeta have completed their masters in international relations and Bengali, respectively, Pooja and Anwesha are MA students. Somdatta is a first-year student. All the five students are members of the Matangini Mahila Samiti, allegedly a frontal organisation of the CPI(Maoists). The samiti was set up during the Nandigram issue and some of the members, including Debolina and Joyeeta, had spent quite some time in Nandigram.
Students cut short Maoist hunt by A staff Reporter (http://telegraphindia.com/1080608/jsp/frontpage/story_9381539.jsp)
Calcutta, June 7: A police team that had gone to search a room rented by suspected women Maoists was forced to turn back today after students and teachers from Jadavpur University stopped the cops from entering without a warrant.
The room, rented by a JU student and an alumnus, was also being used as the office of an organisation called Matangini Mahila Samity.
Although not affiliated to the CPI (Maoists), banned in some states but not in Bengal, the Samity is known for being sympathetic to the rebel outfit and efforts to "protect women from CPM atrocities".
The team from East Jadavpur police station had knocked on the Friends' Row house around 10.30am after a tip-off, apparently from some CPM supporters.
"A police team arrived and wanted to search our room. There was a huge gathering of local CPM workers who were encouraging the police. When we asked to see a search warrant, the police couldn't show it," Jayeeta, a member of the Forum for Arts Students of Jadavpur University, said.
Samity secretary Debolina Chakraborty, among the five women present when the police knocked, said "some pamphlets of our organisation had been put out to dry, which must have been noticed by CPM supporters".
As soon as the cops arrived, Puja Basu, who shares the room with Jayeeta, contacted her teachers and fellow students. Soon, some 60 students and teachers arrived.
"A colleague and I were pushed around by hooligans. I know the girls personally. I was dumbfounded to hear the police suspect them to be Maoists," Bhaskar Gupta, a professor in the electronics and telecommunications department, said.
"Students shouldn't have been harassed. Technical formalities should have been maintained before enforcing the law," said varsity registrar Rajat Bandyopadhyay.
Local CPM leader Pappu Chowdhury said his party had "nothing to do" with the raid.
"We were told the girls had hung Maoists posters and pamphlets out to dry," South 24-Parganas police chief Praveen Kumar said after the three-hour stand-off. "This is why we wanted to carry out a search."
Inspector general, law and order, Raj Kanojia said the police had got "a warrant this evening from the court" and would carry out the raid.
>>
Cops harass JU girls for Maoist links 8 Jun 08 (http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Cities/Cops_harass_JU_girls_for_Maoist_links/articleshow/3110599.cms)
KOLKATA: Nerves were on the edge at Palbazar, a locality close to Jadavpur University, on Saturday, when police laid siege to a rented house in the area where five woman students, who are part of an anti-CPM Maoist front, live.
The cops were, however, forced to beat a retreat four hours after they arrived when students and teachers from the university and rights activists prevented them from taking away the girls who had locked themselves in.
There was high drama, with police trying to force their way in and the girls resisting. All of them — Debolina Chakrabarty, Jayati Das, Roopa Basu, Somdatta Mukherjee and Annesha Sarkar — are members of Matangini Mahila Samity, an outfit that has been working against land acquisition in Nandigram, Singur and other places in Bengal.
Debolina, an ex-student of JU's political science department, had worked among Nandigram villagers before the carnage on March 14, 2007 that led to an uprising against chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee's land acquisition campaign.
However, unlike in other states, Maoist outfits and organizations having links with them are not banned in Bengal. But that did not stop the police from accosting the girls without any search warrants.
Initially, two police officers arrived, acting on a tip-off apparently from local CPM supporters who had seen the girls putting up Maoist posters and carrying the Bengali version of People's March, an extreme Left magazine.
They asked the girls to open the door for "security reasons", but didn't mention any specific complaints. The girls had no specific complaints of cognizable offence against them in the locality.
When the students refused to open the door, the policemen started questioning them about their whereabouts.
Within minutes, a huge police force cordoned off the locality. The trapped students frantically rang up their friends in the university. As the news spread, students, rights activists and two university teachers — Bhaskar Gupta and Anup Bandyopadhyay — reached the spot.
"We could not reach the place easily. We had to make our way through a huge crowd comprising policemen and local CPM leaders, who wouldn't allow us in. I told them we wanted to talk to our students. The police didn't respond. Others waiting in the crowd flexed their muscles and jostled with us. My colleague Anup fell to the ground," said Gupta.
Several members of Association for Protection of Democratic Rights also reached the locality. Sensing the mood, the men in uniform left the spot in a huff amid protests and slogans against them.
Jayati Das recounted how the women were held captive inside their room for hours. "It was a well-planned conspiracy by a section of CPM leaders in connivance with a few police officers. They thought we were soft targets. They would have put us behind the bars had our teachers and fellow students not put up resistance," she said.
Jayati admitted that she had taken part in many anti-CPM movements in Nandigram and Singur.
In March, the police had arrested five girls for putting up Maoist posters in the Baghajatin Station area, and the informers in that case, too, were local CPM members. The girls are still in judicial custody.
Earlier Mithu Ghosh, a tutor from Jhargram, was arrested by state CID sleuths for his alleged Maoist connections. Police said Ghosh had led an arms training camp in Nandigram. This is despite, Sramik Sangram Committee, a trade union, claiming Ghosh as their member and denying any connection with Maoists. Ghosh was released on bail after months behind bars when police failed to prove their claims against him.
And last December, two trainee journalists were detained by members of Nandigram's CPM unit for being 'Maoists' and handed over to the police. Investigations revealed no Maoist links; they had just gone to Nandigram with Medha Patkar's team.
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