Blaming the ruling Trinamool Congress for the killing, the BJP has called for a 12-hour bandh (shutdown) in the Barrackpore area today.
On Sunday evening, BJP leader Manish Shukla was shot dead, about 20 km from north Kolkata, when he was speaking with some locals and party workers near a local police station, NDTV reported.
Blaming the ruling Trinamool Congress for the killing, the BJP has called for a 12-hour bandh (shutdown) in the Barrackpore area today.
Blaming the incident on an internal feud within the BJP, the Trinamool Congress has denied the charge.
Jagdeep Dhankhar, the Bengal governor, condemned the incident in a late night tweet and summoned the DGP (Director General of police) and home secretary to the Raj Bhavan at 10 am.
ACS Home @MamataOfficial and DGP @WBPolice have been summoned at 10 am tomorrow in the wake of worsening law and order situation leading to dastardly killing of Manish Shukla, Councillor, Titagarh Municipality in political party office.
— Governor West Bengal Jagdeep Dhankhar (@jdhankhar1) October 4, 2020
Several men, according to eye-witnesses, on motorcycles suddenly drove up to Manish Shukla, a member of the BJP’s Barrackpore organisational district committee and a former councilor, and fired shots at him incessantly.
Reportedly shot in the head, chest and his back, Shukla was rushed to a private hospital in Barrackpore and then Kolkata; however, he died.
A huge team of cops had to be deployed to calm the tensions that erupted with the BJP supporters heckling Barrackpore police commissioner Manoj Verma and additional commissioner Ajay Thakur, and demanding the immediate arrest of the accused.
Senior BJP leaders rushed to the hospital. They blamed Trinamool Congress for the attack and called for a 12-hour bandh on Monday.
Describing Manish Shukla as “a close associate of BJP’s Barrackpore MP Arjun Singh”, BJP General Secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya blamed Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee for his death.
“We have no faith in the police. As the killing happened in front of the police station, there has to be some link. There should be a CBI probe into it. Arjun Singh had said earlier his life and those of his associates were in danger,” he added.
“I regret Mamta Banerjee that you are resorting to such tactics. The people will never forgive you,” Mr Vijayvargiya said.
“Shri Manish Shukla, BJP councillor from Titagarh, shot dead in front of a police station… Lawlessness in Bengal under Mamata Banerjee is at its peak. Political murders seem to have state sanction and have increasingly become a norm. This violence won’t stop till Pishi is out,” the BJP IT cell chief, Amit Malwiya said.
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