Kolkata, Dec 01: Buses were set ablaze in at least at half-a-dozen places as a down-to-dusk bandh called by the state BJP to protest the rise in power tariff and price of essential commodities turned violent today, with party supporters from Rajarhat-Newtown area going on the rampage in the city, especially in the IT hubs of Salt Lake and Rajarhat.
BJP cadres mobilised from Jangra, Jagatpur, Gourangapur and Jatragachhi in Rajarhat-Newtown area where the party runs the panchayat vandalised IT offices and chased away those reporting for duty.
However, the attendance in the IT sector was near normal.
The IT department of the state government said besides a stray incident outside DLF towers, work went on smooth.
Bhabasindhu Mondal, the panchayat pradhan of Jangra Gram Panchayat and local BJP leader said the many cadres were paid around Rs 150-200 for enforcing the bandh.
The mob that vandalized the DLF complex and HIDCO building in Rajarhat included young cadres like 17-year-old Goutam Mondal, a student of Class X, and 22-year-old Shyamapada Mondal, a daily-labourer in Tegharia. Goutam even boasted having set two buses on fire in Baguihati and Kakurgachi for them defying the bandh call.
Protesters even smashed the car of a doctor who was going to attend an emergency call at a nursing home.
BJP leader Rahul Sinha made no bones about the use of force.
“The people had ignored the bandh call and thought the BJP was a spent force. We had to prove them wrong,” he said.
The police was caught off-guard.
“We did not think a bandh called by the BJP that has hardly any presence in the state would be so violent. However, after they went on a rampage, around 200 additional personnel were deployed immediately in several parts of the city.”
Staet Home Secretary Ardhendu Sen said around 500 people were rounded up for damaging public property.
–Agencies