SANDESHKHALI FAKE CASE ROW: TMC ACCUSES NCW CHIEF OF ‘BIAS’, MAY MOVE EC

KOLKATA: The Trinamool Congress (TMC) on Friday accused National Commission of Women (NCW) chairperson Rekha Sharma of acting on “political bias” and inciting women in Sandeshkhali to register false sexual assault complaints against its leaders, adding it will move the Election Commission of India against her.

Sandeshkhali, a riverine island in North 24 Parganas district, witnessed violent protests earlier this year over allegations of sexual atrocities on women and land grabbing by local leaders of the West Bengal’s ruling party.

“Yesterday, a video surfaced in which a woman could be seen saying how the women’s commission almost forced the villagers to lodge complaints of rape. We have already moved the ECI against BJP leaders. Now we will move ECI against Rekha Sharma, chairperson of NCW,” state’s women and child development minister and TMC spokesperson Shashi Panja alleged.

A purported video of a Sandeshkhali woman shared by the TMC on Wednesday claimed that a local Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader made those women sign on blank papers which were later filled up as complaints of sexual assault.

“A local woman BJP leader took my mother-in-law to the police station saying that the women’s commission has come. I wasn’t home at that time. The BJP leader asked her (mother-in-law) to sign a black document and later we came to know that a complaint of sexual assault has been lodged against four persons,” a Sandeshkhali woman is heard saying in the video.

HT could not independently verify the veracity of the video.

Earlier on May 4, the TMC had shared another purported video, allegedly shot on spy cam, in which a BJP leader from Sandeshkhali was heard claiming that Suvendu Adhikari, leader of the opposition in the assembly, was behind the “whole conspiracy”.