india

Updated: Sep 10, 2019 15:53 IST

A Trinamool Congress (TMC) panchayat leader was murdered and a youth leader critically injured in unrelated attacks in two districts in Bengal on Monday night.

Nimai Mondal (55), the pradhan of Bali gram panchayat in Bengal’s Murshidabad district was shot dead inside the party’s local office, located around 500 metre from his home in Tungi village. The incident took place at around 8.30 pm on Monday. The local TMC workers said that the assailants walked into the office and pumped eight bullets into Mondal. He died on the spot.

“Mondal was a powerful organiser. It was because of him that we managed to attain absolute majority in the local panchayat polls last year. He was earlier a member of the Communist Party of India (Marxist). We suspect that the CPI(M), Congress and Bharatiya Janata Party all conspired to get him killed and hired goons for the job. We want the police to act fast,” said Abu Taher, the local TMC Lok Sabha member and the party’s district president.

Jayanta Das, spokesperson of Murshidabad district Congress, said, “Whatever happens to the TMC, the blame comes on us. The Congress has nothing to do with this incident.” No district police officer was available for comment.

In the second incident, Vinod Singh, the local youth TMC president in Bengal’s North 24 Praganas district and his associate Dipak were shot at from close range inside the party office at Kadamtala Bazar at around 8.45 pm on Monday. Both were admitted in a local private hospital. TMC workers said the three assailants came on a motorcycle and fired at the duo. They exploded bombs while escaping.

TMC district president and civil supplies minister Jyotipriyo Mullick said, “We are trying to identify the assailants. Police will examine footage captured by security cameras. The attack was certainly carried out by criminals backed by some political party. It can be CPI(M) or the BJP.”

Arjun Singh, BJP member from the local Barrackpore Lok Sabha constituency, said, “TMC leaders and members are involved in rivalry over land deals and construction business. They kill each other and blame us. BJP is not powerful enough in the district to enter a TMC office and shoot a leader.”

In another incident, a TMC party office was ransacked and set on fire at Sitalkuchi in the Cooch Behar district of north Bengal. The culprits could not be identified till 10 pm.