Twelve policemen, including four civic police volunteers, suffered injuries in a clash with a group of hooligans who attacked them while the policemen raided a Kali puja fair at a village in Monteswar Police Station limits in Burdwan (East) last night after being told that gambling was going on.
The condition of three of the injured policemen, assistant sub-inspectors Prasanta Pramanik and Idrish Ali and civic police volunteer Sheikh Mustafa, was stated to be critical. The injured policemen were shifted to a private specialty hospital in Burdwan town where the senior police officers including the SP, Burdwan (East), Bhaskar Mukherjee, visited them today. Pramanik who suffered severe head injuries has meanwhile been referred to SSKM Hospital, Kolkata as his condition started deteriorating.
The police continued intensive raids in the village and its adjacent areas and booked 11 persons. The Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate’s Court in Kalna town today ordered six days police remand for five of the arrested persons. The police received a tip off that gambling was going on at Hazrapur village within Putsuri Panchayat areas in Monteswar during a Kali puja last night.
A police team headed by Saikat Mondal. the OC, Monteswar police station entered the village fair organised in connection with the puja. Within minutes, a member of the local puja committee, identified as Jagannath Ghosh, used the public address system to instigate an attack on the policemen. According to the SP, nearly two dozen youths armed with bamboo rods and broomsticks attacked the policemen. They also pelted stones and a police vehicle was ransacked. The unprepared policemen were badly thrashed. Additional police forces were mobilised to the village within an hour but the assailants including Jagannath had disappeared by the time they arrived.