Kolkata: Stirring up a controversy, a senior BJP leader on Monday cautioned the ruling Trinamool Congress in West Bengal that if the attacks on saffron party activists and leaders did not stop in the state, the party will retaliate by targeting four TMC leaders for each such incident in future.
The immediate trigger of the comment was the alleged attack on Murshidabad district BJP leaders Sudipto Chatterjee and Tapas Ghosh. Bombs were hurled at their car at Domkol in Murshidabad smashing its windscreen when they were returning from a party workshop on Sunday.
West Bengal BJP vice-president Biswapriyo Roy Chowdhury told newsmen that two party leaders had a narrow escape.
BJP leader Manish Shukla was shot dead in full public view near Titagarh police station in the outskirts of the city on October 4 in a conspiracy hatched by the ruling TMC, he alleged.
"Every day our workers and leaders are under attack. Some are being killed. If there is no proper investigation into the incidents, if the culprits are not tracked and arrested, we will be forced to take a different path. We will first protest, then resist and ultimately retaliate," Roy Chowdhury said.
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He cited the example of Kerala, where, he said "The RSS and BJP came under attack there in the past by Marxists. When democratic protests failed, four (Marxists) were targeted for every single RSS-BJP activist killed.
"If all other ways of protest fail to yield results, if the prime accused in the attacks are not punished, we will adopt the same formula of four for one in West Bengal. We will choose district-level leaders, state-level leaders," the BJP leader said.
On persistent queries on his comment, Roy Chowdhury said he believed in a peaceful protest in a democracy.