Agartala, March 06, 2023: As many as 668 incidents of violence upon opposition parties, especially CPIM supporters and workers took place after the announcement of election results across Tripura, said CPIM state secretary and newly elected MLA Jitendra Chaudhury on Sunday evening.

A three-member delegation of CPIM on Sunday met with Chief Secretary JK Sinha and apprised him to initiate strict action against the violence unleashed by the ruling BJP-backed hooligans throughout the state. The delegation consisted of CPIM state secretary and newly elected MLA Chaudhury, Left Front convener and former MP Narayan Kar and former Education minister Tapan Chakraborty.

Speaking to media persons at CPIM state headquarters here in Agartala city on Sunday evening, Chaudhury said that the assembly election of 2023 has been beneficial in ruling BJP to retain power for the division of votes. However, 11 percent of votes and a good number of seats have declined, but still retained power. About 60 percent of votes were casted against BJP. The reason behind this loss of BJP is they have their acceptance among people and many have incurred huge losses. Now, again, they have started staging violence throughout the state after retaining power, he added.

Citing instances of violence, he alleged “On the counting day, BJP-backed hooligans had set the house of CPIM worker Mani Dey on fire at Sonamura. After the completion of counting of votes, the ruling party goons had been staging violence from that night itself and continued till today in various parts of the state. In the name of ‘Vijay Michil’, BJP workers set a house of minority family on fire near Gomati SP’s official residence at Rajarbag in Udaipur. Not only this, BJP-backed miscreants have been attacking working and labour-class people demanding subscriptions, looting, setting ablaze, etc. Those who have passenger vehicles are not allowed to roll their wheels unless and until they give subscriptions to the ruling party. An Anganwadi worker was forced to pay Rs 10,000 for ‘Vijay Michil’ as she had complained against BJP goons with the local police station.”

“On Saturday, Chief Minister Prof Dr Manik Saha visited Khowai and Sepahijala districts and held meetings with civil and home administrative officials as the violence is reported to be higher in these two districts. He had held a meeting in presence of BJP state president Rajib Bhattacharjee which cannot be done. Through the meetings, he gave stern warning to the law violators but whether this message is disseminated to the grassroot level, no one can confirm it”, he added.

CPIM state secretary urged the Chief Secretary to call for an all-party meeting at the state level and disseminate the message of no violence.

“After the announcement of election one and half months back, Model Code of Conduct was imposed with which the administration has become neutral to a certain extent. Opposition party offices which were closed for almost five years were opened and party programmes were also conducted freely. Administration started initiating actions and anti-socials were silent. Even the voting percentage was good. As soon as election results were declared, the administration went into hibernation. Anti-socials started rising again and staging violence. There was a rule of law for MCC, but now, terror is gaining its face”, Chaudhury told reporters.

After the announcement of election results, the newly elected MLA said “In the memorandum, we have specifically mentioned that as many as 668 incidents of violence have been staged with names and addresses. Three people succumbed to their injuries even though the attacks were not attempted murder.”

Left Front convener and former MP Kar alleged that those injured persons of opposition political parties are being deprived of getting treatment facilities in different parts of the state. Not only that, thousands of people are forced to leave their homes and roam like vagabonds. Many have to take refuge in jungles.

He appealed to the Chief Minister to restrain the workers of his party from organizing violence activities, if not, the administration will be incapable of doing that. He also claimed that the ruling party cannot show any incident of violent activities after results during CPIM, Congress, etc. regimes.