KOLKATA: The usually chirpy morning at Rabindra Sarobar was cloaked in disquiet on Thursday with regulars speaking in hushed tones as strangers in plainclothes but with the unmistakable gait of cops swarmed the favourite haunt of morning walkers .

The presence of more than 50 state intelligence wing operatives a day after Trinamool Congress MP Kalyan Banerjee had a fracas with walkers triggered outrage. “This place belongs to morning walkers who leave their individual identities at home and enter the arena to breathe in fresh air, exercise and speak to each other. How dare someone defile the atmosphere and try to intimidate us by deploying plainclothesmen to spy on our conversations? He may be an MP but he will not scare anyone here,” fumed Anil Sen, a retired executive of a public sector company.

According to eyewitnesses present during the row on Wednesday morning, the MP was walking past a group of walkers, speaking animatedly in Hindi, when he overheard a remark on Bangladeshi infiltrators. Banerjee butted into the conversation and made some remarks during the heated exchange and threatened to banish some communities from the lake, say witnesses, asking not to be named.

Banerjee, the party’s Lok Sabha chief whip, denies the allegations. “I have been walking at Lake for two decades. Many people there know me there. Yesterday, when I was walking, I was invited to a conversation. People were talking on the infiltration issue. I said there was nothing to discuss for it is a settled issue and our position has been made abundantly clear by my party chief. However, they continued till someone used foul language for a particular community. This, I admit, angered me. I told them this is not Bengal’s culture. Here, we don’t feel it that way. Around the same time, an RSS parade takes place there. It had ended, and around 20-30 people from there gheraoed me. They almost attacked me. Somehow, I left the place. There is not much to say about it.” Banerjee said on Thursday, emphasizing that he had not complained to police.

Morning walkers are, however, furious at the MP’s attempt to “muzzle free speech” at the lake. “We have had enough of hate speeches by politicians when the elections were underway. Now that the polls are over, we don't want to hear any more nonsensical talk. Deploying policemen to keep a watch on us is deplorable. Where were these men when a string of snatchings happened a couple of years ago?” asked businessman Ajay Agnihotri.

While Modi has been the most talked about person at Rabindra Sarobar these past few weeks, much of Thursday’s conversation centred on Banerjee and the manner in which he had tried to give a communal tone to the previous day's incident. “I have been walking at Rabindra Sarobar for over 20 years but never witnessed something as unsavory. It is unfortunate that the MP, a people's representative, has become the most unpopular person here by trying to create a divide between Bengalis and non-Bengalis that I have never perceived here,” said homemaker Sumitra Banerjee.

Not that it would bother Banerjee, whose comments have often embarrassed the government. At the Lake too, he had had a run-in with a senior citizen and two youths a few months ago when he had butted into a conversation between them.

On Thursday, Banerjee remained unperturbed and did the rounds with a posse of securitymen in tow. Later speaking to the media, he claimed that the men who had heckled him were “RSS activists out to destroy the communal harmony in the state”. Morning walkers, however, dismissed the suggestion and said it was yet another blatant attempt to politicize the lake's tranquil atmosphere.

“Till the Lok Sabha elections, it was fashionable for politicians from the ruling party to label any dissident a CPM cadre. Now, it is BJP and the Sangh Parivar. If the chief minister can label someone a Maoist, the MP's reaction is only to be expected. But he should also know that most Marwaris have been here for four generations and are no less Bengali than he is,” said businessman Rajiv Kumar.

Amal Mukhopadhyay, former Presidency College principal, said, “This was merely a conversation. The deployment of police is not only unfair but undemocratic.”

