Kolkata
The neutrality factor of a section of the West Bengal Police might come under the scanner of the Election Commission of India (ECI) before the forthcoming Lok Sabha polls in West Bengal following the recent developments in Sandeshkhali, where the role of a section of the district police administration has been questioned not just by the opposition parties or different national commissions but also by different quarters of the society.
Sources said the role of a section of the state police administration had come more under the scanner of the ECI following adverse observations by the Calcutta High Court and Governor C.V. Ananda Bose questioning the same neutrality factor of the police in Sandeshkhali. Sandeshkhali has been on the boil since last week following protests by local women over the sexual harassment by the associates of absconding Trinamool Congress leader Sheikh Shahjahan, also the accused mastermind of the January 5 attack on ED and CAPF sleuths.
The discomfort in the police administration on this count multiplied after the Calcutta High Court recently made observations of indiscriminately imposing Section 144 in almost the entire Sandeshkhali area soon after the protests by the local women started there.
Armed with the negative court observations, the opposition parties and human rights organizations started questioning the real intention of the administration in imposing Section 144, especially as regards to whether it was done to maintain law & order or to actually stop on-ground information from coming out to the outer world.
