Second prime accused in Sandeshkhali sexual harassment case arrested

Kolkata, Feb 17 (IANS) Shibu Hazra, a local Trinamool Congress leader and one of the two prime accused in the alleged sexual harassment of women at Sandeshkhali in West Bengal's North 24 Parganas district, has been arrested by the state police on Saturday evening. 

His arrest from a hideout at Sandeshkhali, as told by the police, came just hours after the cops registered cases under rape and attempt to murder charges against Hazra and another key accused, Uttam Sardar.

While Sardar is already in police custody, Hazra was absconding for the past one week after the local women protesting at Sandeshkhali burnt down his farmhouse and poultry farm. 

Hazra will be produced before a district court on Sunday.

However, the political mentor of the duo and the mastermind behind the attack on ED and CAPF personnel at Sandeshkhali on January 5, Sheikh Shahjahan, is still absconding ever since the day of the attack. 

Meanwhile, acting DGP of West Bengal Police, Rajeev Kumar, said on Saturday that when the state police launched the probe into the matter, the ED went to the court following which a stay was put on the investigation process.

The DGP was probably referring to the investigation order by a joint special investigation team (SIT) of the state police and CBI, which was passed by the Calcutta High Court’s single-judge bench of Justice Jay Sengupta. 

However, the ED approached the division bench of the high court’s Chief Justice T.S. Sivagnanam and Justice Hiranmay Bhattacharyya against the single bench order and demanded an independent CBI probe into the matter, instead of the joint SIT investigation.

The division bench put an interim stay on the investigation by the joint SIT till the next hearing scheduled in March.

--IANS

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