‘Preventive arrest’: BJP’s Sukanta held on way to Beldanga

Kolkata: The Bengal Police on Wednesday afternoon made “preventive arrest” of BJP’s state president Sukanta Majumdar in Krishnanagar area in Nadia district when he was moving towards violence-hit Beldanga in adjoining Murshidabad to take stock of the situation there, a senior officer said.

The action was taken under Section 170 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS), which states that such arrests are made to prevent the commission of cognisable offences, he said.

“Majumdar’s preventive arrest was made under Section 170 of BNSS. He was heading towards a place where prohibitory orders were in place,” a senior officer of Krishnanagar Police District told a news agency. “I was trying to go to Beldanga to review the situation there.

Our party workers have put up road blockades in other areas in protest against the police preventing us from going to Beldanga,” Majumdar said, soon after his arrest by Kotwali Police Station.

Earlier in the day, Majumdar’s convoy was stopped by the police while he was on his way to Beldanga, where around 17 people have been injured in clashes between two communities.

Police cited the imposition of prohibitory orders in the area and that the BJP leader’s visit might have disrupted peace. Clashes erupted between two communities in Beldanga on Saturday night over an objectionable message on a display board at a temporary gate erected for Kartik Puja.