Bengal guv defends Mamata’s intervention in thana clash

“It was one of these puja clashes that sometimes take place. If the violence went on,police would have to take stronger action. She was afraid that violence may go on. So,she went there,” he said.

Narayanan,who was asked for his reaction to the incident on Sunday,said “it (however) came out in the press differently”.

In an unprecedented intervention,West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee stormed a Kolkata police station late last evening and forced the release of two members of her party arrested for rioting,arson and ransacking the police station about an hour earlier.

The police action came after the men — along with a mob of 300 — clashed with policemen from the Bhowanipore police station who had asked them not to burst high-decibel crackers late in the evening outside a cancer institute and a children’s hospital,and block both carriageways of S P Mukherjee Road,a major south Kolkata thoroughfare.

The men were part of a boisterous Jagaddhatri Puja immersion party. The puja is controlled and managed by one Jagannath Sau,a close associate of Baban Banerjee,one of Mamata Banerjee’s brothers.

Jagannath Sau has six cases — including extortion and cases under the Arms Act — against him,said the officer-in-charge of Bhowanipore police station. Sau was present at the spot — as was Baban Banerjee. Sau allegedly supplies building material to local Congress and Trinamool leaders and men engaged in real estate promotion.