New Delhi: A BJP delegation met Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Tuesday and urged him to institute a CBI inquiry to probe the death of a CPI(M)-turned-BJP leader in West Bengal who was found hanging at a market near his residence.
BJP General Secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya alleged that BJP workers were being attacked in West Bengal and said the delegation urged Shah for a CBI probe into MLA Debendra Nath Roy's death.
In a letter to Shah, the BJP has also raised serious questions about the law and order situation in West Bengal, calling it "Jungle Raaj".
Coming out of the meeting, Vijayvargiya told reporters that they don't trust any investigation done by the state police.
"We condemn the gruesome incident of death of Shri Debabarata Nath Roy of BJP in mysterious circumstances, and we strongly demand CBI investigation into the entire matter. The state police cannot be trusted towards an impartial investigation to apprehend the culprits. The records of earlier sham investigations by state police in hundreds of political killings have established this obvious conclusion," wrote the BJP leaders to Shah.
The three-page letter was signed by Union minister Babul Supriyo, co-observer Arvind Menon, MPs Swapan Dasgupta and Raju Bista apart from Vijayvargiya himself.
Roy's body was found hanging from the ceiling of a verandah outside a shuttered shop near his home in Bindal village in North Dinajpur district on Monday.
His family and party leaders have alleged it was a "cold-blooded murder by Trinamool Congress", a charge the ruling party in Bengal has denied.
"Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee is uncomfortable with BJP's rise. There is criminalisation of police and complete breakdown of state machinery," Vijayvargiya told reporters after meeting the home minister.
He said Shah has sought a report from West Bengal police on Roy's death.
Union minister Babul Supriyo, who hails from West Bengal and was part of the delegation, alleged that the postmortem report of Roy was "manufactured" and the police and the state home secretary were making differing statements.
"We want an independent enquiry and hence we met the president and now the home minister for a CBI inquiry," he said.
The post-mortem report has stated, "Death is due to hanging. No other injury is detected."
Darjeeling MP Raju Bista and Rajya Sabha member Swapan Dasgupta were also part of the delegation.
The team earlier met President Ram Nath Kovind and sought a CBI inquiry; it also demanded dismissal of the TMC government in West Bengal.
State police had recovered a suicide note from the pocket of the BJP MLA and dubbed it a case of suicide. However, the BJP calls it a "murder".
The Hemtabad MLA had named two persons in a purported suicide note found with him, police said.
The saffron party observed a 12-hour ‘bandh' across north Bengal on Tuesday to protest against the "mysterious" death of its MLA, which has become the latest BJP-TMC flashpoint in the state.
With inputs from agencies
Also read: BJP stages protest rally in Kolkata over death of MLA
