Unverifiable: TMC workers vandalized BJP's raths in a godown in Kadapara.

By: Devika Kandelwal
March 3 2021

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Besides BJP's accusation, there is no evidence that TMC workers were responsible for the alleged vandalism.On February 27, a video was shared on Twitter by the National Secretary of Bharatiya Janata Party, Kailash Vijayviargia. Vijayvargia claims that the video shows Trinamool Congress workers vandalizing a godown and BJP's campaign vehicles in Bengal. He alleged that TMC workers vandalized the godown in response to the Election Commission's dates for Bengal's state elections, which were not received well by the TMC. IT cell head, Amit Malviya tweeted, "TMC hoodlums vandalize BJP’s #LokkhoSonarBangla raths in the godown in Kadapara... Raths were damaged and LEDs stolen. This is going to be one tough election for the EC to manage, given the culture of political violence perpetrated by the TMC. People of West Bengal will respond!" BJP alleged that the video shows TMC (Trinamool Congress) workers vandalizing BJP's campaign vehicles or what they call "raths" and also broke LED lights fitted inside these raths. However, besides BJP's accusation, there is no concrete evidence that indicates that it was TMC workers who vandalized the godown or that the men in the video are from TMC. We also decided to look into the video to see this alleged vandalism. On first look, the video does not show any instances of vandalism; instead, it shows a group of men "walking" or somewhat meandering in a godown full of trucks. In the first 15 seconds of the video, you also hear something "breaking," but the video does not show what is being broken. Similar noise of "breaking" can be heard right at the end of the video, but they don't show what is being vandalized. Furthermore, the video, in some places, zooms in to show different trucks and possibly broken windshields, but it is not visible in the video. Another video was shared by BJP Bengal's official Twitter page, which shows a close-up of these trucks, and some trucks in the video have broken windshields in the exact spot (on the left side), but, there is no way to confirm who broke them. According to the Times of India, BJP leaders filed a complaint against the vandalism in a nearby police station where they alleged that TMC workers were behind the vandalism. They said that these men entered the warehouse around 11.30 pm, beat up the drivers with iron rods and bamboo, and broke the windshields of at least seven vehicles. However, the picture of a vandalized truck shared by the TOI was clicked in daylight and we cannot confirm if the picture is from the same night in question. Trinamool leader Saugata Roy told TOI, “We don’t support vandalism". The police subsequently arrested five people concerning the vandalism, according to News Room Post. However, they did not confirm whether the people arrested were TMC workers. District Trinamool leaders also denied the allegation. To verify the information, Logically reached out to the officials at Phoolbagan police station; however, they refused to comment. They asked us to "take it up with the investigating officer" but said the officer is not in, and they do not know when he will be in. Since we cannot confirm whether TMC workers vandalized the property, we conclude that the claim is unverifiable. We will update this claim when we get more information.