Honour HC order on Nandigram says WB Governor

Haldia/Kolkata, Dec 2: After visiting Nandigram for the first time since violence erupted in the village, West Bengal Governor Gopalkrishna Gandhi today said the Buddhadeb Bhattacharya Government should honour the Calcutta High Court order on March 14 police killings here.

The governor also said that the traumatised people of the village would take some time to normalise, adding, “Normalcy is returning, but not an easy process."

His visit came few days after he had a phoney war with the Left leaders.

On November 9, Gopalkrishna had said that the manner in which the 'recapture' of Nandigram villages was being attempted “was totally unlawful and unacceptable."

"I find it equally unacceptable that while Nandigram has been ingressed with ease by armed people, on the one hand, political and non-political persons trying to reach it have been violently obstructed," he had said.

A day after Gopalkrishna"s remark, the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) said that the Governor had crossed the "constitutional limit of the highest office of the state."

The Left Front chairman Biman Bose alleged that the Governor "failed" to maintain neutrality.

The Calcutta High Court, on November 27, had issued a criminal contempt notice to Biman Bose for his remarks that the judiciary was taking biased stand on the Nandigram issue.

On November 17, Bose has said the court ruling that March 14 police firing in Nandigram was "unconstitutional," and a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe into it was intervention of judiciary into the work of legislature.

The High Court, on November 16, had dismissed all petitions filed by the Buddhadeb Bhattacharya Government in connection with the Nandigram violence on March 14.

The High Court, however, asked the State Government to give compensation of five hundred thousand rupees to the families of those who were killed, two hundred thousand rupees to women who were raped or molested, and one hundred thousand rupees to those who were injured.

The West Bengal Government had planned to set up a Special Economic Zone (SEZ) for chemical industries in Nandigram, but had to abort the project as villagers refused to give their farmland for the project.

The row saw violent clashes between residents opposed to the project and the communist supporters as well as police.

ANI
>