BJP worker critically hurt as party factions clash in Titagarh after Arjun Singh event

A BJP worker was critically injured and police used batons to break up a clash between two rival groups within the party in Titagarh, North 24 Parganas, late on Friday night, days after a public row between Barrackpore MLA Kaustav Bagchi and state Transport Minister Arjun Singh.

The violence broke out as people were leaving a Vijaya Sammilani, the post-Durga Puja get-together, organised by the BJP's Titagarh mandal, according to IANS, ETV Bharat Bangla and Bartaman. Arjun Singh had attended the event and left before the clash.

What happened

The programme ran late into the night. As workers left, another group allegedly attacked them outside a pharmacy a short distance from Titagarh police station, the reports said. Police reached the spot quickly and used a lathicharge to restore order.

The injured man, who handles IT work for a local BJP unit, was taken first to BN Bose Hospital in Barrackpore and then, as his condition worsened, to Sagore Dutta Hospital in Kamarhati, according to IANS and ETV Bharat. Bartaman reported he was admitted at Sagore Dutta. His condition was described as critical.

An investigating officer at Titagarh police station confirmed that an assault had taken place and said the cause was being investigated, ETV Bharat reported. No arrests had been reported by Saturday afternoon.

Two versions

Santosh Singh, president of the BJP's Titagarh mandal, alleged that the attack began after the minister left and was led by a man he described as a former Trinamool Congress worker. He alleged that the same person had been seen at Kaustav Bagchi's birthday celebration, and that the injured worker's house had been vandalised earlier. He said the worker had been brutally beaten, according to IANS. Bartaman reported that he demanded an arrest within 24 hours.

Some BJP workers alleged that remarks Bagchi had made about Arjun Singh had stoked the tension, IANS reported.

Vishal Jaiswal, the BJP Yuva Morcha's district president, who ETV Bharat described as close to Bagchi, rejected the allegations. He called the incident a neighbourhood quarrel with no link to any MLA, minister or BJP leader, and said the injured man was not part of the party's IT cell.

Bagchi and Arjun Singh had not commented publicly on the clash by Saturday afternoon. The Declaration is not naming the man accused by the mandal president, as no case against him has been reported.

Background

The Barrackpore industrial belt has long been one of Bengal's most violent political battlegrounds, and Arjun Singh, a former MP from the area, is among its most prominent politicians. Titagarh is also where BJP leader and lawyer Manish Shukla was shot dead outside the party office on October 4, 2020. The state CID later arrested several people, including contract killers.

On October 26, Bagchi publicly criticised Arjun Singh for allegedly sharing a stage with two people named by Shukla's father as accused in the murder, according to PTI. "Some of our people are being seen with Manish Shukla's killers. It does not look good," Bagchi said. He threatened to set himself on fire in front of the BJP's state headquarters if the two were inducted into the party, and said he had written to Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari, the chief secretary, the CID chief and the Barrackpore police commissioner.

Arjun Singh brushed off the criticism. "I know how to do politics," he said, according to PTI. One of the two men said his appearance was due to personal ties with the minister and that he had left the Trinamool long ago.

Trinamool spokesperson Kunal Ghosh said at the time that the BJP would keep drawing in former Trinamool leaders because it lacked leaders of its own in Bengal.

What happens next

Police in Titagarh are investigating the assault. Neither the BJP's state leadership nor the government had commented on the clash or on the dispute between the MLA and the minister by Saturday afternoon.