‘BJP forced 3 Sandeshkhali women make false rape plaints, sign blank papers’

Kolkata: Trinamool Congress (TMC) on Thursday alleged that the women in Sandeshkhali claimed they were made to sign on a white paper by a woman BJP leader and then false rape complaints were written in their names.

On Thursday, TMC’s spokesperson Riju Dutta claimed on his social media X account: “Not one, but at least 3 women of Sandeshkhali publicly named @BJP4Bengal leader Piyali Das, who deceived them into signing on a white paper.”

Dutta was rebutting a post by BJP’s IT cell head Amit Malviya. Dutta further wrote: “All of these women have claimed that the rape complaints were FAKE. They even said that the BJP leader (who is not even a voter of Sandeshkhali and was brought from Delhi) had threatened these women who wanted to revoke the false complaints made in their name.

You and your bosses’ conspiracy has been exposed. People of Bengal, especially women, will teach you a lesson, democratically. For mere votes, you people played with the modesty of women of Sandeshkhali. Shameful!

What else can we expect from a Party that is a breeding ground for RAPISTS?”

Malviya had written on social media: “... the WB Police was so eager to please the Bengal CM that they forced women, including now BJP candidate Rekha Patra, to say on camera, that they were never raped and had been receiving all assistance. Their cover up blew up when the BJP got access to Rekha’s affidavit in Court, in which she had stayed firm on the rape charge. The BJP has since filed a case on Bengal DGP and others for revealing a rape victim’s identity, in violation of Supreme Court’s order.” He also alleged that the video being referred to by TMC was AI generated and the BJP leader Gangadhar Kayal who was purportedly seen in it claiming that it was a BJP conspiracy,denied saying anything like that and has now written to the CBI to include the fake video in their investigation.

Trinamool also posted another video which purportedly showed a reporter wanting to ask BJP candidate Rekha Patra a “last question”, which was on this video clip, but he was asked to end the interaction. TMC wrote on X: “Ever heard of ostrich effect? It’s when people bury their head in the sand to avoid facing backlash. Here’s an example: when quizzed about the Sandeshkhali sting operation video, BJP MP candidate from Basirhat Rekha Patra’s security intervened and snatched away the journalist’s microphone. Why this fear of facing scrutiny if you really are innocent? If you didn’t act on the instructions of @SuvenduWB and manipulate women to file false rape charges?”

Meanwhile, the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha in their X post tagged a news article on this Sandeshkhali controversy and wrote in Hindi, what roughly translates in English: the society wants freedom from dictatorship.