TMC leader arrested for murder of youth on suspicion of stealing buffalo

Diamond Harbour: Local Trinamool Congress leader Tapas Mallick, one of the 10 persons named in the lynching of an ITI student in Diamond Harbour of South 24 Parganas district, has been arrested, police said on Friday.

Tapas, the TMC Upa-Panchayat Pradhan of the area, was absconding ever since his name surfaced in the FIR lodged by the family of Kaushik Purkait who was beaten to death on Monday night.

He was arrested from near Duttapukur in neighbouring North 24 Parganas district late last night, a senior police officer said.

He was accompanied by a youth named Biltu from the car in which they were travelling, the officer said. The youth has been detained.

Four others had earlier been arrested in connection with the murder of the youth, who was mercilessly beaten up on suspicion of being involved in theft of buffalo from the area, the officer said.

Koushik, who came to visit his aunt in the area, was roaming around when he was confronted by members of a local club and forcibly taken to a room on Monday night.

He was later rescued by his relatives who rushed to the spot on hearing about the incident and took him to Diamond Harbour Hospital. He died hours later at S S K M Hospital in Kolkata on Tuesday.

The incident triggered a public outrage in the area with a mob vandalising houses of the accused when the youth's body was taken to the house of his aunt in a procession on Wednesday.

Opposition CPI(M), Congress and BJP visited the family of the deceased and demanded punishment for those involved and immediate arrest of Tapas, alleging that he was deliberately not being arrested by the police despite playing a key role in the confinement and lynching of the youth.

While the four other arrested have already been remanded to 13-days' police custody by SDJM court, Diamond Harbour on Wednesday, Tapas would be produced in the same court later in the day. Nine others were also been named in the FIR by the youth's family.