KOLKATA: After Assam and Bihar, the BJP-ruled West Bengal government is also likely to withdraw police cases registered against protestors following the violence that erupted during a rally organised by the Left student union with the support of the Cockroach Janata Party (CJP) at Esplanade in Kolkata on Friday.
The protestors were demanding the resignation of Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan over the NEET question paper leak.
At a news conference in Delhi on Monday, the CJP said it would be “forced to sit in protest again” if the FIRs were not withdrawn and the students were not released, as promised by the central government.
The party expressed concern over the arrest of protestors in West Bengal and Bihar. It also announced that it would launch a website where lawyers from across the country would be encouraged to register if they wished to assist those being prosecuted. Senior advocate Kapil Sibal would guide the initiative.
The CJP had withdrawn its street agitation following a promise from the Centre that the protestors would not be targeted, at least in states ruled by the BJP or its allies. However, the West Bengal government has continued its crackdown on them.
Hours after the CJP's warning, the Assam and Bihar governments issued separate notifications announcing the withdrawal of all cases filed against protestors who had participated in rallies held in the two states on Friday as part of the nationwide protest against the NEET paper leak.
The West Bengal government has not yet taken a decision to implement the Centre's instructions. However, highly placed sources at the state secretariat said a notification on the withdrawal of cases against the protestors could be issued later today.
Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari, while addressing a rally in Jalpaiguri on Monday, asked BJP workers to remain vigilant against what he described as a resurgent "tukde tukde gang".
In Kolkata, seven cases were registered at Hare Street and Entally police stations under the West Bengal Public Safety and Control of Anti-Social Activities Act, 2026, also referred to as the 'anti-goonda law', following Friday's violence. The Bill was passed recently in the West Bengal Legislative Assembly.
Kolkata Police have arrested 16 men for allegedly vandalising property during the protest. Seventy people have been identified as alleged troublemakers involved in attacks on police personnel and media persons at Esplanade's Dorina Crossing, where thousands of students and members of the public had gathered after a protest march from Sealdah station, around 2 km from the site of the violence on Friday.
While addressing the Assembly on Saturday, the Chief Minister had said that the state government had implemented the 'anti-goonda law' for the first time since the Bill was passed in the House.
“The miscreants involved in the incident will be given strict punishment so that their three generations can keep it in their memory,” Suvendu had said, expressing displeasure over the alleged attacks on police personnel and media persons at Esplanade.
“Police were repeatedly provoked by the agitators, but they remained restrained. Everybody has seen how shoes and bottles were hurled at the police. The protestors wanted the police to resort to lathicharge so that the ‘drama’ could continue, but the police didn’t allow them to take that opportunity,” he had said in the House, adding, “Seventy people have been identified, but none of them is a student or a CJP member. These people have no link to the NEET movement.”