The college in Sabang, in West Bengal's West Midnapore District, where the 21-year-old student was allegedly beaten to death on Friday.
Opposition parties took to the streets at a number of places in West Bengal on Saturday, to protest the murder of 21-year-old college student Krishnapada Jana, allegedly by workers of the ruling Trinamool Congress. Protests stretched from Kolkata to Asansol, with normal life taking a hit in Sabang, where the murder took place.
Leaders of several opposition parties, including the Congress, which had called the 12-hour bandh in Sabang, paid their last respects to Jana, whose body was brought to the college before being taken home for the last rites. The son of a poor farmer, Jana was beaten to death at the college where he had studied at Sabang in West Midnapore district, about three hours from Kolkata.
Jana's family, which lives at Neela village about five kilometres away from the college, is shocked and distraught, especially by claims that he was not a student of the college where he was killed. He had failed twice in his first year.
"My brother had gone to fill the exam form. It is the Trinamool Chatra Parishad which is behind the incident," claimed his brother, Narayan Chandra Jana.
Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has denied links between the murder and her party supporters. She hinted at a factional fight within the Congress's Chatra Parishad, of which Jana was a member. "What I found out about the incident is that there was a clash inside a union room. The union was the Congress's Chatra Parishad. It was not the Trinamool union room. And the room was locked from inside. There was trouble inside. The boy died of injuries from a bat. The clash took place inside a locked room," she said.
But the Congress is crying foul. They confirm that Jana was a member of its student wing, the Chatra Parishad, and alleged that Trinamool students beat him to death. The CPM and the BJP have also slammed the ruling party. State Congress leader and Sabang MLA said, "I urge the Chief Minister to hear the real facts. She has been misinformed about the incident."
CPM Rajya Sabha MP Ritabrata Banerjee, said, "Jana has been killed by Trinamool goons and the reaction of the government is pathetic. The education minister is saying he was unsuccessful in clearing his exam. That raises a serious question. If someone is unsuccessful in an exam, does that give the right to ruling party to kill him inside the campus?"
At the college where the murder took place and in Sabang town, an uneasy quiet holds. In Kolkata, there were large protests by the youth and students wings of the Congress and the Left. Three people arrested so far have been remanded to police custody for four days.