West Bengal post-poll violence: Calcutta High Court reserves order after final hearing

Calcutta High Court (HC) on Tuesday reserved the order after the final hearing in the West Bengal post-poll violence. During the hearing, the Calcutta HC asked the Solicitor General to provide records of all the suo moto cases on the matter. The court further said that if any party wants to submit documents, they can do by Wednesday 2:30 pm. 

Bengal post-poll violence: Petitioner demands case to be transferred to an independent agency

Advocate Priyanka Tibrewal, who is one of the petitioners in this matter, remarked that the Bengal post-poll violence probe should be handed over to an independent agency. She said, "The state is accusing NHRC of being biased and that there was no violence. We have come to the conclusion that there was violence. This should be handed over to an independent agency."

Earlier, the Calcutta HC had granted the West Bengal government time till July 31 to file supplementary affidavits in response to the report by the National Human Rights  Commission (NHRC) on alleged post-poll violence in West Bengal. In response to this, the Bengal government had sought time to submit supplementary affidavits, which were questioned by Priyanka Tibrewal since sufficient time has already been given by the court. 

NHRC had said it submitted the final report after which it received 16 cases where victims were threatened to withdraw complaints, which were forwarded to the Director-General of Police (DGP). The Court had said it would not look into the cases received by NHRC after the submission of the final report. Several incidents of violence have been reported at various places after the announcement of the Assembly poll results on May 2, after which a four-member team deputed by the Ministry of Home Affairs also visited the post-poll violence-affected areas.

TMC denies charges

The TMC has denied all charges made in the report. The party hit out at the BJP government and said that the party leaders were exaggerating the isolated clashes. CM Mamata Banerjee had also hit back at the panel and called the report misleading. She had said that the facts were distorted and that her Government would submit their opinion through an affidavit to the court when their turn comes. Furthermore, Mamata had also claimed that the NHRC report on the post-poll violence was leaked before it could be submitted to the High Court.

(Image: PTI, Pixabay)