The Supreme Court will on Tuesday hear a petition seeking an inquiry by a Special Investigation Team or the Central Bureau of Investigation probe into alleged post-poll violence in West Bengal, the Hindustan Times reported. A two-judge vacation bench of Justices Vineet Saran and BR Gavai will hear the case.

Last week, the court had issued a notice to the West Bengal government on the petition filed by an individual Biswajit Sarkar, Live Law reported. The petitioner sought investigation into the death of his brother Avijit Sarkar and another Bharatiya Janata Party member, who were allegedly killed by Trinamool Congress members during post-poll violence in West Bengal.

The wife of the other deceased BJP member, Haran Adhikari, is the second petitioner in the case.

Senior Advocate Mahesh Jethmalani, appearing for the petitioners, told the court that the West Bengal Police took no action after the “brutal murders” and that attempts were made to “subvert the investigation”.

West Bengal witnessed a spell of incidents of violence in the days that followed the Assembly election results on May 2. The BJP and the ruling Trinamool Congress blamed each other for deaths of multiple party workers. Various news reports put the toll between 11 and 14, but the police did not confirm the numbers.

Incidents of fake news also emerged as several BJP leaders, including MP Swapan Dasgupta tweeted about “rape and molestation” of women and claimed that “more than a thousand Hindu families” were under attack in Nanoor in Birbhum district. In another incident, BJP’s state unit deleted a video from its official Facebook page after a journalist pointed out that he had been falsely identified as someone who was killed in post-poll violence in the state.

The Trinamool Congress had emerged victorious after the country’s longest-ever Assembly elections, held in eight phases, amid the massive rise in Covid-19 infections in the country. The Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress won 213 seats – way beyond the majority mark of 148. The Bharatiya Janata Party managed to secure only 77 constituencies.