Scores of villagers turned up at block development office (BDO) in Sandeshkhali on Saturday. The development is the result of Bharatiya Janata Party’s initiative of conducting a mass outreach programme for locals to register their complaints at the BDO against the excesses — land grabbing to sexual harassment — of the Trinamool Congress leaders in Sandeshkhali . Since then, more than 700 applications have poured in. It has been six days since the programme started.
Moreover, the State has also started the process of returning land that had allegedly been taken by TMC leaders.
“We have received over 700 complaints in the last six days. Over 150 were related to land grabbing and 70 were extortion cases related to money. We have started to return land to owners,” Arun Kumar Samanta, block development officer of Sandeshkhali-II Block, told reporters.
The outreach programme has no connection with police reaching out to women to register complaints of sexual assault. Several women had alleged that TMC leaders Sheikh Shahjahan’s and his aides Shibu Hazra and Uttam Sarkar sexually harassed them.
“Complaints have said that their land was forcibly taken from them. TMC leaders took land on lease but money was never given in exchange. Grievances related to state government-aided services such as old age pension, jobs cards and others were also registered,” said Samanta.
“We have initiated the process of land return. Officers go for field visits and inspections and after verifying land is returned to genuine owners. We have identified 60 such land plots and started to hand them,” said Samanta.
He said that when it comes to complaints about extortion, each case is being verified and referred to higher-ups, who will take a call on how to return the money to villagers.
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