In an apparent damage-control exercise, the Trinamool Congress expelled Sheikh Shahjahan, the don of Sandeshkhali, a day after his arrest.
This action comes about two months after his men attacked a raiding team of Enforcement Directorate officials and, notably, a day before Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Arambagh in Hooghly district of Bengal.
Speaking about the decision, TMC MP Derek O’Brien and State Minister Bratya Basu said Shahjahan was suspended from the party for six years and challenged the BJP leadership to take similar action against their leader and MP Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh, who is accused of assaulting women wrestlers.
“There are two types of parties... One type of party talk, talk and talk while the other types like the Trinamool Congress... Walk the talk,” O’Brien said.
Basu alleged that, taking advantage of some stray incidents “against which the TMC always takes a truthful decision,” the Opposition parties like BJP were out to malign the Government.
Alleged to be the “fund manager and rigging expert” of his party in large parts of North 24 Parganas, Shahjahan was arrested on Wednesday night about two months after he hit the national headlines when his men beat up and seriously injured a raiding team of Enforcement Directorate officials.
Apart from masterminding the attack on the ED team, Shahjahan, a Trinamool Congress leader and district board member of North 24 Parganas, is also charged with mass land-grabbing and alleged sexual assault on women in Sandeshkhali and the neighbouring riverine islands of the district.
ADG, South Bengal, Supratim Sarkar, said Shahjahan was arrested late on Wednesday night from the Minakhan area, adding that he had been forwarded to Basirhat court. The TMC leader has been remanded to 10 days police custody, sources said.
A few of his cronies, including local TMC leaders Shibu Hajra, Uttam Sardar, and Ajit Maity, had already been arrested earlier.
Earlier, the Calcutta High Court had instructed the police to arrest him without delay.
Sandeshkhali has been in the national news after Shahjahan’s men attacked the ED on January 5.
Subsequently, after about a month, emboldened by his absence from the area, hundreds of women rose up in revolt, complaining of land grab, sexual assault, and surrounded the local police station.
Since then, the area has been on the boil with successive visits of national commissions for women, SCs, and STs, almost all of whom have demanded the imposition of President’s Rule in the area.
Regarding the TMC leadership’s claim that they are the real party with a difference that acts against corrupt members, Bengal BJP president Sukanto Majumdar said, “It is all drama being enacted by Mamata Banerjee... to save her face... Shahjahan had been under TMC’s protection for the past two months.
The CPI(M) also said Shahjahan was an asset of the TMC and “the party could not afford to expel him... Not only because his goons rig polls, but also because he knows too much about TMC’s money laundering.”
Meanwhile, the ED has moved the court, saying Shahjahan could tamper with the evidence for which the agency had raided his house.
The agency could soon seek his custody in the `10,000 crore ration scam that has landed senior TMC leader and former Bengal Minister Jyotipriya Mallick in jail.
