Two police complaints against Sonowal by TMC in Kolkata

Kolkata: Two police complaints were lodged against Assam chief minister Sarbananda Sonowal in the city today over alleged “manhandling” and “illegal detention” of TMC delegates at the Silchar airport on Thursday by Assam police officials, TMC MP Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar said.

One complaint was filed at the Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose International airport police station under the Bidhannagar police commissionerate and another at Alipore police station in the city.

TMC MLA Mohua Moitra had herself filed the complaint at Alipore police station. The charges made against Sonowal by the TMC were illegal detention of public representatives and manhandling, Dastidar said. An official of the Bidhannagar police commissionerate confirmed receiving the complaint from Dastidar. “I and our party MP Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar have lodged two separate complaints against the Assam CM over manhandling and illegal detention yesterday. We were assaulted by the police officials (at Silchar airport),” Moitra said. Dastidar and Moitra were part of the delegation of the eight-member TMC delegation comprising six MPs, an MLA and a state minister, who were stopped at the Silchar airport and taken into preventive detention.

They had travelled to Silchar to assess the ground realities in Bengali-dominated Cachar district of Assam after the final draft of the NRC was published in that state on Monday.