Bengal govt moves SC against NIA’s Beldanga probe

Kolkata: The Bengal govt has challenged in Supreme Court the Centre's NIA probe order into the Jan 16-17 Beldanga violence. An 8-member NIA team is in the Murshidabad town since Saturday after taking over the probe from Bengal Police.A senior Bengal govt officer said: "Yes, the NIA probe has been challenged in Supreme Court." The officer did not provide any further details.
The Centre has a wide berth to order an NIA probe in cases involving national security, explosives and arms, and organised crime. Sources said the Bengal govt plea argued that the Beldanga violence did not fall within the scheduled offences under the NIA Act.This is not the first time the Bengal govt has challenged an NIA probe order. It had argued against a 2021 NIA probe order into violence at BJP neta Arjun Singh's Bhatpara home. The state govt held that explosion of crude bombs could not be termed as a national terror act. In 2023, the Bengal govt also challenged Calcutta High Court's NIA probe order into Ram Navami violence that year. The SC did not interfere with the HC order.On Tuesday, NIA indicated that it was probing "cyber-instigation" through which local people were misled and provoked by projecting a case of suicide as a murder. Sources said the NIA sleuths also collected digital footprints of such accounts and were examining them.Violent protests broke out in Beldanga on Jan 16 following the death of a migrant worker in Jharkhand. A large number of people took to the streets by blocking railway tracks and National Highway 12 for several hours, and even attacked policemen and mediapersons. The protests continued for another day, resulting in the disruption of traffic movement on NH-12.A PIL was filed in Calcutta HC seeking deployment of central forces in Beldanga, as well as an NIA probe into the violence. A division bench gave freedom to the Union govt to order an NIA probe. Thereafter, the Union home ministry gave the go-ahead to NIA to begin the probe.