Nandigram firing: FIR filed against cops

A team of lawyers on Wednesday filed an FIR charging senior IPS officers who had led the March 14 police action in Nandigram with murder.

The FIR, the first to be filed at Nandigram police station after last week's incident, was registered under Section 302 of IPC (murder) on the basis of a written statement by Bindu Das, the widow of a victim named Panchanan Das.

The FIR named IGP (Western Range) Arun Gupta, DIG N Ramesh Babu, East Midnapore's Superintendent of Police G A Srinivasan, Additional Superintendents of Police P K Roy Chowdhury and Shyamal Bhattacharya and the officers in-charge of Nandigram and Khejuri police stations as the accused.

A 45-member team of lawyers from West Bengal Bar Council and Calcutta High Court Bar Association, led by Uttam Majumdar, filed the FIR.

The 42-year-old Bindu Das, in her statement, alleged that her 50-year-old husband was shot dead at Gokulnagar in Adhikaripara of Nandigram-I block on March 14 in unprovoked firing by the police, Bar Council vice-chairman Majumdar said after filing the FIR.

Bindu was, however, not taken to the police station as she was afraid of leaving her village, counsel Anwar Ali said.

According to her statement, Panchanan, a resident of Keshabpur village in Nandigram, had gone to the place of incident to watch a puja of Radhagobinda Gouranga, when the police chased him along with hundreds of other villagers.

The FIR alleged that Panchanan was killed in unprovoked firing and claimed that the order for such firing had been given by the accused officers and that his body was taken to Tamluk Sadar Hospital and handed over to her on March 17 for cremation.