BJP stages protest seeking CBI probe into party MLA's death

The Bharatiya Janata Party on Wednesday staged protests outside police stations across West Bengal for a CBI probe into the alleged killing of party MLA Debendra Nath Roy. The party's state unit president Dilip Ghosh alleged that political violence and murders are on the rise in West Bengal under the Trinamool Congress dispensation.

"We are democratically fighting to bring about a change and it will culminate in the 2021 assembly elections in the state," he said. The Hemtabad MLA's body was found hanging from the ceiling in a verandah outside a shop near his home at Bindal village in North Dinajpur district on Monday.

Protests were held outside police stations in Kolkata, Bidhannagar (Salt Lake), and other parts of the state, and the BJP leaders submitted memorandums to the station in-charges at some places. Party Lok Sabha MP Soumitra Khan went to the Kolkata police headquarter to submit a memorandum to the commissioner, but with the main gates closed, he handed it over to an officer.

Alleging that West Bengal has been turned into a "police raj" by the Mamata Banerjee government, BJP leader Sayantan Basu said attempts are being made by the state government to hide the truth in the MLA's death by claiming that it was a death by suicide. Leading a demonstration in front of a police station in the city, BJP Mahila Morcha (West Bengal unit) president Agnimitra Paul claimed that there were "several loopholes in the suicide theory put forward by the police and the administration." The state BJP leadership claimed it was a case of murder, and alleged foul play by the local TMC leadership in North Dinajpur district, within which Roy's constituency is situated.

Party state-level leaders Sayantan Basu, Jayprakash Majumdar, and Sabyasachi Dutta, a former TMC mayor of Bidhannagar who joined the saffron party last year, were at the forefront of a protest rally before the Bidhannagar police commission. Alleging that Roy was killed, the BJP had called a 12-hour bandh in north Bengal on Tuesday, even as the post-mortem report released on the same day said Roy died due to hanging and no other injury mark was found on his body.

The BJP leader's family has also demanded a CBI inquiry into the incident, saying they suspected he was killed.