HC sets up panel for violence-hit West Bengal people

KOLKATA: The Calcutta high court has directed the setting up of a three-member panel to oversee the return of those displaced from their homes during post-poll violence in West Bengal. The panel will comprise a representative each from the state and national human rights commission, besides a member-secretary of the West Bengal Legal Services Authority.
A five-judge HC bench of acting Chief Justice Rajesh Bindal and Justices I P Mukherji, Harish Tandon, Soumen Sen and Subrata Talukdar directed the panel to get in touch with the police officers of assembly constituencies, based on complaints lodged by victims with the state legal services authority, and ensure their safe return home.
“People have the right to return home and live peacefully. It is the duty of the state to ensure that law and order is maintained,” the bench said, reminding that law and order was a state matter. It also directed the panel to submit an action-taken report. The bench of had, at the last hearing, warned state officials of “serious consequences” if they failed to respond to complaints of post-poll violence. Counsel for the petitioners Priyanka Tibrewal pleaded that 200 people were not being allowed to return home amid the pandemic.