Kolkata: SFI leader's death triggers massive protests

A leader of Communist Party of India - Marxist students' wing Student’s Federation of India, who was arrested after a clash with the police, died in Kolkata on Tuesday.

Massive protests over the death of the student broke out not just in Kolkata but also in Chennai on Wednesday. The protestors and the Left Front attacked the Mamata Banerjee government.  
 
His death triggered a row with the men in uniform claiming he fell from a vehicle while the party alleged that he succumbed to injuries sustained in lathi-charge by police.
 
Joint Commissioner of Police, headquarters, Javed Shamim told PTI that 22-year-old Sudipta Gupta died in a city hospital.
 
"He received an injury in an accident when he, along with 30 others, was being taken in a bus after being arrested. There was no lathi-charge by the police," he said.

WATCH: Protests over SFI leaders death in Kolkata 
 
The incident happened when SFI supporters gathered in Rani Rasmoni area of the city to participate in a protest rally to demand college union elections in the state.
 
Police claimed the SFI supporters turned violent and threw rotten tomatoes and eggs at the police personnel deployed in the area. Police then arrested several SFI supporters.
 
Thirty of them, including Gupta, were put into the bus, from which he accidentally fell and was injured. He was immediately shifted to a government hospital, where he died on Tuesday evening, the police said.
 
The hospital authorities said Gupta was admitted with a head injury and was administered all possible medical help.
 
Asked whether he was lathicharged, the hospital spokesman said, “We need to wait for the post-mortem report."
 
Senior CPI-M leader Mohammed Salim alleged that Gupta died in police custody and said Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, who is also the home minister of the state, needed to answer why the youth was "brutally killed".
 
The state Congress leadership also demanded an independent inquiry into the incident.
 
"The death was not natural -- it was unnatural. So, an independent inquiry is a must to look into the incident in order to reveal the truth," state Congress president Pradip Bhattacharjee said.
 
Police said four police officials were injured seriously during the scuffle with SFI supporters.