Leader of Congress in Lok Sabha Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury Saturday questioned the silence of West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee in the mysterious death of student activist Anis Khan and said that she has forgotten the Muslims who had reposed faith in her since her party’s win in the state election.
Chowdhury, who is also the WBPCC president, alleged that the state government is trying to hide the truth behind the incident and stop investigation into it.
Chowdhury, who met the the student activist’s family members at their house at Amta in Howrah district during the day, claimed that the special investigating team formed by the state government to probe the death ”would yield nothing but rubbish”.
He raked up the death of Rizwanur Rahman, a graphics trainer, who according to the CBI probe was driven to commit suicide in 2007. ”Didi (Banerjee) had spearheaded the movement following Rizwanur’s death because she had no option then. Now because the elections are over, the Muslims have been dumped by her.” Rizwanur was found dead near the rail track in Kolkata in Sptember 2007, a month after his marriage to the daughter of industrialist Ashok Todi. The Supreme Court had in March 2011 had asked CBI proceed with the case as suicide.
The death had rocked the state and Banerjee had spearheaded a movement against the then Left Front government of Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee and demanded the CBI probe into it. ”Why is the chief minister silent in this case? Why hasn’t she sent any of her ministers to meet Anis’ family members? The people of Bengal want to know the mystery behind his death. But it seems that the state government is trying to stop the investigation as the chief minister and the TMC government are trying to hide the truth behind the death. We will not let them succeed in that,” Chowdhury told reporters.
”There will be no investigation done by the SIT … Nobody will believe that a civic police man would kill somebody unless he was ordered”.
A civic police man was among the four police personnel who had reportedly forced their way into Anis’ house on the night of February 18 and took him to its second floor. His body was later found by his family members from outside the building. Chowdhury alleged that Anis’s family members are being given death threats to force them withdraw their demand for a CBI probe.
He said that Congress will move the National Human Rights Commission in the case. ”We will continue with our protests and if needed help Anis’ family to meet President Ram Nath Kovind and take the case to the National Commission for Minorities”. Chowdhury also was critical about the state government’s Deucha Pachami coal project and questioned its ”commercial viability”.
”Nobody is willing to invest here. This is a concealed coalfield and several hundred metres have to be dug to get coal. Nobody knows whether this will be a viable project or not,” he said. The the state government is yet to publish any notification with regard to the project though it has already planned to evacuate around 21,000 people from the area, he said. The state government is investing about Rs 35,000 crore in this project which is spread across 3.04 lakh acres and Banerjee has announced jobs for one member of each family that donates land, besides increasing the compensation package.
