Kolkata Gang-Rape: BJP Supporters Assault 'Reclaim the Night' Protesters as Ministers, MPs Arrive at Law College

Kolkata: Supporters of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on June 30 (today) beat up and allegedly sexually assaulted agitators at the South Calcutta Law College who were protesting against the gang-rape of a student in the college premises, by men with ties to the Trinamool Congress party. The protesters have filed a first information report.

The supporters had accompanied a BJP ‘fact-finding team’ who had arrived at the college in Kolkata’s Kasba area. The members of the BJP fact-finding team included Union ministers Satpal Singh and Meenakshi Lekhi, and MPs Biplab Kumar Deb and Manan Kumar Mishra. They were accompanied by former IPS officer and BJP leader Bharati Ghosh and BJP’s Agnimitra Paul.

The team had initially told reporters upon arriving in the city that they had been barred from going into the college, but could be seen going in upon arriving at the scene. 

BJP's Meenakshi Lekhi, Bharati Ghosh and Satpal Singh at the South Calcutta Law College. Photo: The Wire.

A student had been gangraped last week by three men – two of whom were enrolled at the college, and a third who was a former student, Manojit Mishra, who is understood to have enjoyed significant clout there. Mishra is close to the TMC brass and reports have recorded the number of times he has been alleged to have misbehaved with and sexually harassed women. All three, along with a security guard of the college, have been arrested and are in police custody. The incident, less than a year after the rape and murder of the young doctor at the city’s R.G. Kar Medical College and Hospital, has stirred similar protests and calls for justice.

One of the groups active in these agitations is Reclaim the Night, Reclaim the Rights – a women’s, transpersons’ and queer people’s collective that had its roots in the R.G. Kar movement in August last year. Members of the group were sloganeering against the BJP and its communal politics to the southeast of the main gate of the college, as the ‘fact-finding team’ made its way into the college premises. 

“We reject the BJP’s attempts to politicise this. We remember how not long ago sexist and misogynist lines were uttered by BJP leaders who are eager to communalise society,” one of the members of the Reclaim the Night said into a microphone. 

Members of Reclaim the Night at the college before the skirmish. Photo: The Wire.

As the team entered the college, BJP supporters – first raising slogans against the Communist Party of India (Marxist) and its young wing Students Federation of India – charged at the protesting group. The group carrying BJP flags predominantly comprised men. Members carrying these flags tore the Reclaim the Night's banners and landed punches and kicks at the protesters. One of the protesters, who said they did not want their name to be published, was injured in the skirmish and their sleeve was torn, the group has claimed. 

"BJP-RSS workers tried to break our protest meet by attacking protesting comrades, tearing women comrades' clothes, sexually assaulting them and breaking our mics," the group said in a Facebook post in Bengali.

"They surrounded us, trapped us and created an environment of mob lynching, molesting women protesters,” said Jhelum Roy, a member of the collective.

The Wire could not independently verify the sexual harassment claim but was witness to the physical assault.

BJP supporters meanwhile raised slogans claiming that the opposition CPI(M) and SFI were stooges of the ruling TMC – a party which has, once again, found itself inextricably linked with an incident that sheds light on the state of women in Bengal and the situation of party-run student unions.

“Not everything is news,” a BJP supporter told this writer as she took the photo of him tearing the banner pictured below.

A banner torn by BJP supporters at the site of the South Calcutta Law College in Kolkata, where a student was gang-raped by three, with ties to the TMC. Photo: The Wire.

With central forces, MPs’ individual security, state police and media present, the skirmish broke soon. A supporter of the BJP said to another that they had “roughed up the CPI(M) well.” 

As the BJP fact-finding team left, Reclaim the Night took out a march to the Kasba police station to file a police complaint against the alleged assault and sexual harassment.

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