kolkata

Updated: Nov 21, 2018 08:10 IST

About two and a half months after the Supreme Court decriminalised same sex relationships, a couple Swapan Biswas (45) and Bikash Das (34) came under attack from the owner of their house in a Bengal district allegedly because of the nature of their relationship.

According to a complaint lodged with Chakdah police station in Nadia district, about 65 km from Kolkata, the owner of the house beat up Bikash Das with a wooden plank on Sunday afternoon and showered abuses on him.

“On November 18, 2018, when I was cooking, Ananda Das and his wife descended on me and said we must vacate the house today itself. When I said November 19 was the last day and we would leave on that day, they refused to listen, began to abuse us in the vilest of terms and landed blows on my right jaw and hand with the wooden plank with which the door is ‘locked’,” wrote Das in a one-page complaint.

Das received a total of three blows as a result of which his wrist was swollen and he could not move it.

The inspector-in-charge of the police station said that he received the complaint but there was no mention that the attack was due to the objection of the relation Das shared with his partner. Police did not arrest anybody.

“After we were beaten up we were confused by the suddenness of the attack and thought that if we mentioned our relation in the complaint the police may not take cognizance,” said the duo.

The owner of the house denied the attack. “They used to frequently consume alcohol and got into noisy altercations, disturbing the peace of the house,” the wife of Ananda Das alleged to the media.

Incidentally, the apex court decriminalised same-sex relations on September 6 this year.

Biswas and Das share a relation that dates back to 2007, when Das, who studied till class 9 used to work for a hosiery unit in North 24 Parganas district. “We met in the compartment of a train in the Sealdah-Krishnagar section,” recalled Biswas.

Biswas, who studied up to class 5, is employed as a casual staff in Eastern Railway and earns about Rs 14,000 per month. In 2009, Das informed his family of his feeling towards his partner, shocking his family members. However, the family did not give their consent to it.

“We quickly grew close to each other. However, my partner objected to my job. After we began living together, I gave up my job and concentrated on cooking and household chores,” said Das.

About 19 months ago, the duo started living in a rented house of Ananda Das. “We used to pay a monthly rent of Rs 1,600 for a 13 ft X 11 ft room and a kitchen,” said Biswas.

However, soon after the owner of the house discovered their relation, he and his family members allegedly began to harass the couple. “We were constantly taunted. They used to call me a hijra and targeted me with expletives,” alleged Das.

Under constant pressure and harassment to vacate their home, Biswas and Das scouted for another house on rent less than a km away from where they lived.