TMC syndicate war reaches doorstep of party MP Saugata Roy in south Kolkata's Lake Gardens, 2 injured

According to reports, six people have been arrested so far while a police picket has been posted in the area where the violence broke out over the demolition of a residential house supposedly for the building of an apartment building.

Admitting that such an incident occurred close to his house (only two houses apart), Roy told local media, "I feel very bad."

The MP, who was at his residence when the incident occurred and called the police, told journalists, "Such incidents did not happen even during the Railway Colony movement or the Naxalite period."

Roy, who said the incident rattled the elderly people living in the area, has asked police to stop the demolition of the house that led to the clash over the share of its spoils.

Police later arrived at the scene and stopped the work.

Meanwhile, reacting to the development, CPI-M state secretary Md. Salim said: “TMC leaders should be thanked for sparing Saugata Roy... The incident has been orchestrated to send a message to Saugata Roy for his reaction to the Hanskhali incident.”

With West Bengal earning notoriety over the existence of syndicates for any real estate development in the neighbourhoods, the expression has even found a slot in Wikipedia which describes it as "an organized form of running corrupt extortion rackets, mostly in the manufacturing and construction sectors, that became prevalent in late 2000s in West Bengal."

While syndicates started during the rule of the previous Left regime in the state when it started acquiring land for the Rajarhat township in 1995,  it earned its present notoriety since the Mamata Banerjee led Trinamool Congress came to power.

In West Bengal, the syndicates under the ruling party patronage control monetary transactions of any construction activity, especially over selling of lands and construction of buildings with the groups forcing the people to buy materials from their cartels.

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee was left embarrassed back in 2016 when Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina called her up over an extortion racket run by a TMC party leader, threatening her elderly associate in Kolkata's satellite township of Salt Lake (Bidhannagar) for handing over the property to realtors.