TMC claims BJP's Suvendu Adhikari orchestrated 'Sandeshkhali conspiracy' to defame Bengal, cites sting video

The video, which was circulated online and cited by the TMC, had a man, identified as the BJP’s local ‘Mandal Sabhapati’ Gangadhar Kayal, admitting that he and other saffron party workers had made women allege that they had been sexually harassed by former TMC leader Sheikh Shahjahan.

Kolkata: The Trinamool Congress on Saturday cited a video circulated online to claim that the allegations of atrocities on women of Sandeshkhali in North 24 Parganas of West Bengal by one of its local leaders and his aides were fake and the agitation by the purported victims was stage-managed by the Bharatiya Janata Party.

The BJP, however, dismissed the video cited by the TMC as doctored, alleging that the state CM Mamata Banerjee’s party had insulted the women, who had been protesting against the atrocities on them, by questioning their allegations about sexual harassment in Sandeshkhali.

The video, which was circulated online and cited by the TMC, had a man, identified as the BJP’s local ‘Mandal Sabhapati’ Gangadhar Kayal, admitting that he and other saffron party workers had made women allege that they had been sexually harassed by Sheikh Shahjahan, a local leader of the party led by Banerjee. It also had Kayal stating that Suvendu Adhikari, a senior leader of the BJP in West Bengal, had encouraged them to make women launch the agitation against the local TMC leaders.

Kayal, however, later claimed that the video had been doctored using Artificial Intelligence (AI). He wrote to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) seeking a probe into the video. He alleged that the video had been circulated as part of a conspiracy hatched by the TMC general secretary Abhishek Banerjee and the IPAC, a political consultancy farm.

"The Sandeshkhali incidents were preplanned. The BJP had scripted it well. The truth has been exposed. I have been saying this for a long time. The cat is out of the bag," Banerjee said at an election rally in Chakdah in Nadia.

Sheikh was arrested almost two months after the January 5 attack on the Enforcement Directorate officials during a raid at his residence in connection with a case of irregularities in the public distribution system in the state. The assault on the ED was followed by an agitation by local women protesting against atrocities by Sheikh and his aides known to be owing allegiance to the TMC.

The BJP turned the protests by women against the alleged sexual harassment by Sheikh Shahjahan into a major political weapon against the TMC. The party organised tours by the protesting women to different Lok Sabha constituencies to narrate their ordeal.

 “The truth can be twisted and a misleading version can be circulated. However, it's shelf life is very very short. Ultimately, Truth prevails,” Adhikari, the leader of the opposition in the state assembly, said.