Padma Shri awardee singer Purna Das seeks Bengal CM's intervention over alleged land grab involving TMC leader

KOLKATA: Purna Das Baul, the 93-year-old internationally acclaimed Baul singer and Padma Shree awardee, on Wednesday met West Bengal Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari at the latter’s outreach programme, Janata Darbar, at Salt Lake, seeking his intervention to reclaim his farmland in Birbhum district, which has allegedly been forcibly occupied by a former Trinamool Congress strongman and his associates.

Besides alleging that his farmland in Ilambazar in the district was forcibly occupied, the nonagenarian Baul singer also lodged a complaint with the chief minister on Wednesday alleging that his residence in Kolkata had been demolished.

Purna Das Baul, accompanied by his son Dibyendu Das and daughter-in-law Aditi Das, was among more than 100 people who attended the ‘Janata Darbar’ organised by Suvendu at the Bengal BJP office and submitted grievances seeking redressal.

While Purna Das Baul did not name the person allegedly occupying his land, his son identified him as 'Kesto Mandal' and alleged that he was accompanied by 'Sheikhs' involved in the land grab.

Dibyendu virtually indicated the involvement of Anubrata Mondal, alias Kesto Mandal, former Birbhum district Trinamool Congress president and a close associate of former Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee.

Anubrata has distanced his political involvement with Mamata Banerjee and joined the rebel camp led by Ritrabrata Banerjee after the Trinamool Congress suffered a crushing defeat to the BJP in the assembly elections in Bengal.

"Since the day of lockdown in 2020, my farmland at Ilambazar has remained occupied by people who wield considerable influence," the internationally acclaimed singer said.

"I had never imagined this," he said, recalling the honours he had received for bringing laurels to the state and the country, including recognition from the previous Trinamool Congress government.

According to Dibyendu, their farmland has been forcibly grabbed and a multi-storey building complex has illegally come up on the plot. Earlier, they had approached Anubrata Mondal during the Trinamool Congress regime, seeking intervention over the alleged illegal grabbing of the land, but nothing was done, the family members alleged.

They also alleged that their residence in Dhakuria in southern Kolkata had been demolished and that they had been evicted.

They said the Dhakuria residence was their only place of shelter after the Ilambazar land was allegedly occupied forcibly by some influential persons in the area.

Meanwhile, Nadia resident Somnath Malo, a gold medallist at the 2002 South Korea Paralympics, also attended the programme carrying the medal he had won while representing India.

Malo, a resident of Taherpur, is among the 26,000 teaching and non-teaching staff who lost their jobs in the 2016 SSC recruitment case following orders of the Supreme Court and Calcutta High Court that invalidated the recruitment process.

"I was patted by Atal Bihari Vajpayee. But due to the corruption in the earlier TMC government’s teaching and non-teaching recruitment, I am staring at an uncertain future and facing starvation." he said.