West Bengal has been disgraced. The worst development that could have happened in the immediate aftermath of Tuesday’s killings of eight people at Bogtui village in Birbhum district has been the unseemly slugfest between Raj Bhavan and Nabanna, initiated it must be said by the former, and the spirited campaign by the political class generally against the ruling dispensation. The unseemly kerfuffle cannot hide the ugly truth.

The nature of the serial killings, notably of women and children who were charred to death, points to a well calibrated endeavour, a grisly expression of calculated malevolence. The mayhem is suspected to be the fallout of the murder of a local Trinamul functionary. This is the facet that seems to be beyond dispute though Director-General of Police Manoj Malaviya’s contention that the “killings do not seem to have any political connection” appears to have infuriated the Opposition not the least because it was advanced even before the Special Investigation Team ~ a state government embroidery ~ had begun its probe.

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We do not know whether the internal bickering has reached its nadir; yet we do know that the tragedy recalls the gut-churning Sainbari killings in Burdwan (1970); the Bantala outrage and killings, and the calculated murder of Ananda Marg footsoldiers in Kasba’s Bijon Setu in 1982. In a word, as life stumbles in different parts of West Bengal, the state remains remarkably insensitive irrespective of the party in power.

Apart from a few arrests, the “benching” of the local police station’s officer-in-charge and the “shunting” of Rampurhat’s Sub-Divisional Police Officer, no other action appears to have been taken even four days after the macabre tragedy. There has been much too much of tirades and verbal demarches; a spirited response from the Chief Minister; and far too little of substantive action on the ground. Not to put too fine a point on it, the response of the administration has been almost perfunctory, considering the enormity of the tragedy. The mayhem is embedded in a distribution of spoils.

The carnage followed the murder of a certain Bhadu Sheikh, who was the deputy chief of the Trinamul-run gram panchayat. He is said to have controlled the illegal sand and stone trade in the area. Small wonder that he had near total control over political affairs in this backwater of Bengal. Prima facie, reports from the spot suggest a lack of coordination between the district police and the civil administration. No action was taken on periodic reports from the district administration.

The end was quite totally horrendous. The failure of the district intelligence network was direly palpable. The eight victims were burnt together in their sleep. And yet there was no indication of the build-up of tension, let alone the merciless end. From the CPI-M to Trinamul, the obituary of victims can be as heart-rending as that.