Bengal governor M.K. Narayanan will visit the Eastern Frontier Rifles (EFR) headquarters in West Midnapore’s Salua tomorrow, 11 days after Maoists attacked the Shilda camp and killed 24 policemen.
The governor’s trip comes at a time chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee has not made such a visit despite EFR policemen insisting on his presence at the headquarters a day after the rebel attack.
“The governor will be visiting Salua tomorrow morning in a bid to boost the sagging morale of the EFR policemen there after the Maoists killed 24 of them in Shilda. He will start off from Raj Bhavan at 7am and will go by road. At Salua, he will talk to the EFR authorities at their headquarters to understand their problems and may suggest safeguard measures. After the Shilda attack, the EFR jawans had demanded the chief minister’s presence at Salua but he could not make it. It’s good that the governor is going there,” an official at Writers’ Buildings said.
The chief minister, who did not attend Writers’ Buildings because of fever on February 15 — the day of the Maoist strike on the Shilda camp — had sent a team of five ministers to Salua to attend a gun salute to the slain policemen.
“During the gun salute, EFR men and their families shouted slogans against the state government and demonstrated in front of the ministers. They kept complaining that the state government had failed to provide security to them. They blocked the vehicles of the ministers and demanded that the chief minister should come. However, that didn’t happen,’’ said an aide to agriculture marketing minister Mortaja Hossain who had been to Salua to attend the gun salute.
Asked about the possibility of similar demonstrations by the EFR policemen when the governor visits Salua tomorrow, state home secretary Ardhendu Sen said: “Governor is governor. The people out there know what to do when a governor visits a place. They may be peeved about some issue. But we should not do anything that embarrasses the governor. We hope nothing of that kind will happen.’’
The armed police director-general, Partha Bhattacharjee, and the armed police inspector-general, Vivek Sahay. will accompany the governor to Salua.
Asked whether Narayanan had expressed his desire to the state government that he wanted to visit Salua, Sen said: “I can’t say anything about this.”
According to sources in the state government, Narayanan was keen on going to Salua a day after the Shilda attack but was told by the administration that the “tense’’ situation there was not conducive to a visit.
“The government told the governor that the situation in Salua was tense and EFR jawans were in a frenzy. He was also briefed on the resentment expressed by them in the presence of the ministers. The government urged the governor to pay a visit after such resentment dies down a bit,’’ a source said.
Source: http://www.telegraphindia.com/1100226/jsp/bengal/story_12154123.jsp
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