Author: Sabyasachi Bandopadhyay
Publication: The Indian Express
Date: November 24, 2002
URL: http://www.indianexpress.com/full_story.php?content_id=13676
Introduction: Lid blown off sleaze
racket run by local Left leaders, CM promises action
No red flags were waved in support
of these women; no flash strikes, rasta rokos or dharnas announced in their
name. For two long years, several women were raped, molested, filmed in
the nude and blackmailed in Sutia village in West Bengal's North 24-Parganas
district by a crime syndicate packed with CPM leaders. Local government
officials looked the other way, the police looked the other way. And if
the CPM's branch and zonal committee leaders were in the know, they kept
this sordid secret close to their bleeding hearts.
The lid blew off the CPM's latest
scandal in the first week of August, when around 25 First Information Reports
(FIRs) were filed and when the Pratibadi Mancha (Forum of Protest) was
formed. But there was no outrage until November 1, when a four-member delegation
of the State Women Commission visited Sutia and spoke to the women. And
came away, in the words of one member, feeling ''sick and nauseated''.
And late last week, on Friday, seven women recorded their complaints at
the CID investigation cell here.
Eighteen-year-old Chandrima said
in her complaint that she was raped while visiting her grandparents in
January this year. She accused Bireshwar Dhali, a CPI(M) supporter, of
having raped her inside her grandparents' home in Sutia. In another case,
the syndicate exploited a woman's estrangement from her husband. ''They
told me to pay Rs 10,000, failing which they threatened to destroy my reputation
by accusing me of leading an immoral life,'' said Madhumati in her complaint.
When she refused, she said, she was raped in front of her husband.
''What happened in Sutia is medieval.
It is barbaric. As we went through the complaints, I felt sick and nauseated,''
said Goiraka Ghosh, a member of the women's commission. The commission's
chairperson, Jasodhara Bagchi, presented the team's findings to Chief Minister
Buddhadeb Bhattacharya on November 18. ''It is unbelievable and simply
barbaric,'' Bagchi, a CPM veteran, reportedly told Bhattacharya. He in
turn is said to have admitted that ''there are many black sheep in the
party now.'' And, promised action.
''It's not only the CPI(M), even
Trinamool Congress supporters were involved in these heinous crimes,''
Jiten Bala, founder of the protest forum, said.
''All of them acted in tandem.''
But there has been some action since Sutia's skeletons began tumbling out:
16 villagers have been arrested and more arrests are expected. ''We have
arrested the kingpins of this syndicate,'' Harikrishna Dwivedi, District
Magistrate of North 24 Parganas claimed. Why only now, why not earlier?
''The women filed complaints only in August,'' said Dwivedi.
The Officer in Charge (OC) of Gaighata
police station which governs Sutia village, Sanjit Chakrabarty, refused
comment.
''You write whatever you like. Write
that the OC himself raped the women,'' he said.
(Names of the complainants have
been changed)
