Two shot dead in north Bengal during student's protest, political blame-game started

KOLKATA: Two men were shot dead during an agitation programme by school students at Islampur in North Dinajpur district demanding appointment of teachers in the school. The deceased victims, identified as Tapas Burman and Rajesh Sarkar, were the ex-students of the same school. The incident took place late afternoon on Thursday following a violent clash between students and police near the school campus.

Both Sarkar and Burman received bullet injuries during the clash and were rushed to the local hospital. While Sarkar was declared brought dead, Burman succumbed to his injuries on Friday. The eyewitnesses and the family members of the victim claimed that 'both were killed in police firing', however, the West Bengal police in a statement said that there had been ‘no firing’ by police.

“In Darivit High School incident at Islampur, two persons who died were outsiders and not students of the school. Misinformation of police firing is being spread by some motivated persons with vested interest to foment further breach of peace in the area.The unruly mob were armed with deadly weapons and they attacked police due to which one policeman suffered gun shot injury and few others were injured. Police investigation is on to find out the instigators. Seven persons were arrested,” said the statement.


While tension simmers in the area, BJP called a 12 hour strike. State education minister Partha Chatterjee said that ‘strict action will be taken against the instigators’. “All aspects would be investigated. Whoever the culprits were, BJP or RSS, would not be spared,” said Chatterjee.

BJP’s state president Dilip Ghosh has demanded a CBI investigation into the incident.