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Ex-minister in custody for Trinamool murders
Former minister and CPM’s Garbeta legislator Sushanta Ghosh was remanded in police custody for seven days on Thursday for his alleged involvement in the murder of seven Trinamool Congress supporters. HT reports.
Former minister and CPM’s Garbeta legislator Sushanta Ghosh was remanded in police custody for seven days on Thursday for his alleged involvement in the murder of seven Trinamool Congress supporters.
The case goes back to September 22, 2002, when armed CPM cadres murdered seven Trinamool supporters in West Midnapore’s Keshpur. Two bodies were found, the rest were missing.
On June 4 this year, five skeletons were recovered from a spot behind Ghosh’s ancestral home at Benachapra. A DNA test by the Central Forensic Sciences Laboratory, the report of which was made available on August 8, confirmed that two of the skeletons were of the missing Trinamool supporters.
The victims were identified as Ajay Acharya and Raju Singh. In June, after the skeletons were found, Acharya’s son Shyamal had lodged a complaint with the police.
Ghosh, a legislator from Garbeta since 1987, who had got anticipatory bail from a Midnapore court on August 9, was arrested.
“My party and lawyers will decide on the next step. I have full faith in the law,” Ghosh said at the courtroom on Thursday after chief judicial magistrate Manoj Rai delivered his verdict.
“However, I must mention that ever since the new government came to power, it has tried to implicate me in a false case and send me to jail,” he added.
Minutes later, Criminal Investigation Department officials took custody of Ghosh, who was to be taken to Kolkata for questioning.
Hundreds of people who had gathered outside the court began hurling stones at the car as he was being taken out. The police had to resort to lathi-charge to control the mob fury.
