BIRBHUM BOWS TO THE BAHUBALI

In Bengal, even Robin Hood figures can come draped in a halo of grey. Whether the stories surrounding him be fact or legend, one man who exemplifies this is Anubrata Mondal.

- Romita Datta

Of all the Trinamool Congress strongmen who rule their fiefdoms with an iron grip, Mondal is perhaps the most formidable. The party’s Birbhum district chief, he leapfrogged from those boondocks to hit the mainstream news circuit when his name was whispered in connection with the revenge killings on March 21 at Bagtui village, where nine people were charred alive. Birbhum, upwards of 150 km north from Kolkata and home to Tagore’s Santiniketan, is mired in a petty gridlock of organised crime. And he comes with the reputation of being the master of ceremonies. Locals say “even a fly cannot enter Birbhum without Anubrata’s knowledge”. How, then, his opponents ask, could an incident such as Bagtui come to pass unbidden—even if he has claimed ignorance?

But that’s speculation, and that isn’t why the CBI is after Anubrata. If he has confined himself to a VVIP cabin of the state’s premier government hospital, SSKM in Calcutta, it’s because of repeated summons in a multi-crore cattle smuggling case. He has given the slip to the agency five times by now. With the Calcutta High Court refusing to grant him relief in the case, his time may be running out. The CBI is keeping an eagle eye on his well-being, even as his followers perform a yajna back home.