Attack on BMC officer: BJP under fire, OAS officers in dist ceasework

The brazen manner in which BJP activists stormed the Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation office, dragged the Additional Commissioner Ratnakar Sahu out, kicked and rained blows on Monday outraged people and has snowballed into a major administrative and political crisis.

- STATESMAN NEWS SERVICE BHUBANESWAR, 1 JULY:

The OAS across several districts went on protest leave on Tuesday while the staff of BMC sported black badges and sanitary workers stopped work.

Yesterday, CM Mohan Charan Majhi held a meeting with OAS officers Association members following which they postponed their mass leave protest but officers in many districts refused to defer their agitation.

The fact that police have arrested five of those involved in the attack failed to convince officers as well as Opposition political parties here as they demanded arrest of Jagannath Pradhan, the defeated BJP MLA candidate whose supporters had bashed Ratnakar Sahu.

Interestingly, Pradhan today claimed that he had telephoned Sahu to find out why he had dismissed a woman, swachata sathi. Sahu questioned my authority to question him and when some of my supporters went to him, he was equally abusive resulting in the act of violence which is condemnable.

The lady swachata sathi has also lodged a police complaint against Sahu today.

OPCC president Bhakta Charan Das lambasted the BJP for spreading "its culture of violence" in the state. They are well known for such practices in different parts of the country and now they are enforcing the same policy in Odisha. They intimidated and beat up officers who refused to carry out their illegal orders, alleged Das. He also referred to the ACP of Bhubaneswar Nrusingha Bhol alleging that he had directed subordinate officers to break the legs of Congress protests in another incident.

We have lodged a police complaint and the government must remove such a police officer from service, demanded Das.

The BJD held a media conference today describing the attack on the BMC officer as 'barbaric'.