Supreme Court judge Justice Indira Banerjee recuses from plea on West Bengal post-poll violence

Supreme Court judge, Justice Indira Banerjee on Friday recused from hearing a plea relating to post-poll violence in West Bengal. .The vacation bench of Justices Indira Banerjee and MR Shah ordered the case to be listed before any other bench of which Justice Banerjee is not a part.The plea filed by Biswajit Sarkar, the brother of deceased Bengal BJP worker Abhijit Sarkar, alleged that Abhijit was murdered when violence broke out after the Mamata Banerjee led All India Trinamool Congress secured a convincing victory over the BJP in the 2021 assembly elections..The plea sought formation of a Special Investigation Team (SIT) so that the murder of Sarkar and a Bengal BJP booth worker, Haran Adhikari, can be enquired into..Supreme Court seeks response from West Bengal govt on plea for CBI probe into killing of two BJP workers .It was submitted that on May 2, Avijit Sarkar was dragged outside his house and was "murdered."The petitioner and the co-petitioner, who is the widow of Adhikari, stated that they are eye witnesses to the incident.."The mob tied the CCTV camera wire around his neck, strangled him and started beating him with bricks and sticks. They smashed his head and brutally killed him in front of his mother, who seeing her son slaughtered in front of her own eyes lost consciousness and collapsed on the spot," the plea stated..The plea also alleged that there has been "indiscriminate" killing of innocents across the state of West Bengal "in a coordinated manner.".Another plea is also pending before the Supreme Court seeking relief for those people who have been "internally displaced" due to post poll violence in the State..However, the West Bengal government has maintained that these are “concocted stories” spread on social media by miscreants.“It is untenable to categorise each and every act of violence following the declaration of elections results as ‘post-poll violence’ while adopting a premise that such violence is ongoing in West Bengal to which the State machinery is turning a blind eye”. False allegations of State complicity was drawn on the basis of hearsay reports disseminated on social media by miscreants. The apex court was misled about the law and order situation. The petitions “reek of political motivation,” it said.