Court rejects Gurung's anticipatory bail plea

DARJEELING: The Gorkha Janmukti Morcha (GJM) has cried foul over the arrest of one of its central committee leaders from Kurseong on Friday, the same day when a Darjeeling court rejected the anticipatory bail plea of party chief Bimal Gurung and his wife Asha in the Madan Tamang murder case.
Bimal Darjee, GJM central committee member and one of the founding leaders, was arrested from his house at Tindharia in Kurseong subdivision early Friday morning.Binay Tamang, the GJM assistant secretary, said it was the ploy of the state government to create panic in the Hills ahead of the Lok Sabha polls. "The intention of the state is to ensure smooth sailing for the Trinamool Congress (TMC) in the LS polls," he said.
On the other hand, the district and sessions court in Darjeeling rejected the anticipatory bail plea of the GJM president and his wife. "The bail plea of Gurung and his wife Asha was rejected by judge Ananta Kumar Kapri. The government prosecutor opposed the bail plea as it wanted to give a message that nobody was above the law and everyone had to abide by it," said Pranay Rai, the public prosecutor (PP).
The PP said the GJM president had applied for an anticipatory bail on March 5 before the election code of conduct was enforced and the final hearing was on Friday. "Now that their bail plea has been rejected the only option available with them is to knock on the high court doors," said Rai.
According to the PP, 36 GJM leaders and activists were named in an FIR filed by Mahesh Thakuri, the police constable appointed to guard All India Gorkha League (AIGL) president Madan Tamang who was murdered in the broad daylight on May 21, 2010, in Darjeeling. Thakuri was also shot on the leg on that day but survived. He had lodged a complaint against Gurung and his wife and 34 others.
Meanwhile, Binay Tamang also said they had an intuition that something like this was on its way given the attitude of the state government. "We knew something like this was on its way. However, such arrests will definitely backfire on Trinamool. We will write to the Election Commission of India and apprise them of the arrest," he said.
Darjee was produced before the additional chief judicial magistrate (ACJM) court on Friday but his bail was rejected and he will have to appear for a hearing on March 19. He has been booked under various non-bailable sections. Akhilesh Chaturvedi, the Darjeeling SP, refused to elaborate but confirmed the arrest of the GJM central committee leader. "There are several pending warrants for which we are trying to make the arrests. Today's arrest is also one of them," he said. Police said there are more than 600 pending arrest warrants.
In the Tamang murder case, seven people are out on bail, while eighteen are still lodged in a Kolkata correctional home. Of the remaining eleven, one person died under mysterious circumstances, while Nicole Tamang, a central committee leader, managed to flee during an interrogation from a government guesthouse in Siliguri in 2010.
The others named in the FIR include GJM general secretary Roshan Giri, Kalimpong MLA Harka Bahadur Chettri, GTA Sabha chairman Bhupendra Pradhan and GTA deputy chief executive Colonel (retired) Ramesh Allay, Babita Ganguly, Dinesh Subba and Sangey Yolmo. Giri will have to appear before the court on March 19 as his anticipatory bail plea was also rejected.
Dinesh Chandra Rai, the defence counsel for Gorkha Janmukti Morcha, said that he would move the high court.
"Since the bail plea was rejected, we will approach the high court after the polls," he said.