‘Excessive force on peaceful protesters’: Death of Congress worker during ‘Raj Bhavan Chalo’ march kicks up storm

Significantly, the Congress called the nationwide ‘Raj Bhavan Chalo’ march to protest the BJP-led central government’s stance over various issues, including the row over industrialist Gautam Adani and the Manipur crisis.

Mridul Islam, 45, who was part of the over 1,000 protestors marching towards the Guwahati Raj Bhavan

The protesters, led by Assam Congress president Bhupen Borah, began to march towards Raj Bhavan at around 10:30 am from Latasil in Guwahati. Some other workers also sustained minor injuries in the kerfuffle, Congress leaders said.

On his part, Guwahati Commissioner of Police Diganta Barah said a post-mortem is being conducted to ascertain the cause of death and that a magisterial inquest had not found external injury marks on his body. But he also confirmed that the police had used three tear gas shells to help disperse the crowd.

The police had set up three layers of barricades outside the Raj Bhavan, and the protestors had broken through two before the police resorted to tear gas, he said.

“We did not use any other kind of force. We did not use lathi charge. We also did not fire the tear gas shells from guns. We rolled the ammunition on the ground to release the smoke… Despite that, some of their people moved forward but could not cross the third barricade. They sat there for some time and protested and dispersed. After they dispersed, we got to know that one of the people who was part of the protest was unwell,” he said, also claiming that Congress had not sought permission for Wednesday’s demonstration.

Congress worker Supriya Ahmed, who was part of the protest, said soon after the use of tear gas, Islam began to feel unwell.

“I took him to a bus we had come on and made him lie down and fanned him. He said that he had inhaled a lot of smoke. He slowly got worse and some of his friends then took him to the hospital,” she said. He was first taken to a private hospital nearby, where the doctor directed them to GMCH. According to police, he was declared dead on arrival at GMCH.

But Congress has alleged the use of “excessive force” on a “peaceful and democratic” group of protesters. In a complaint submitted at the Latasil police station in Guwahati, the Congress demanded that “immediate and strict action be taken against the responsible police personnel for their excessive and unlawful use of force, which directly caused the death of an innocent citizen”.

The party also denied the allegation that the protest march was held without seeking police permission, pointing to a letter that its general secretary (Administration) purportedly submitted to the Police Commissionerate Tuesday informing the latter of the demonstration.

“They released not just one or two but three tear gas shells at the same time right under people’s faces. We have never seen such a thing. We have seen tear gas before but not released right under people’s faces. We are not scared and we will not let Mridul Islam’s death go to waste. We will consider him the first martyr in the battle against the BJP’s misgovernance in Assam,” Assam Congress president Bhupen Borah told reporters, seeking a “high-level enquiry” into the incident.

Meanwhile, several journalists covering the protest were also affected by the tear gas, with the Gauhati Press Club condemning the incident.

“The Gauhati Press Club urges the civil and police administration authorities to ensure no further recurrence of such incidents. Police and other personnel engaged in mob control or law and order control be trained on dealing with such situations more efficiently and without causing injury or harm to those present at the site for their professional duty,” read the statement.