KMC Dismantles Plaque Bearing Name Of Fake IAS Officer Along With TMC Leaders

The Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) on Friday dismantled a controversial plaque bearing the name of Debanjan Deb, arrested for allegedly organising fake Covid-19 vaccination camps masquerading as an IAS officer, along with Trinamool Congress lawmakers and a minister.

Two TMC MLAs lodged police complaints claiming that their names were on the plaque, installed at the base of a bust of Nobel laureate poet Rabindranath Tagore at Taltala area in central Kolkata, though they did not have any knowledge about the programme.

The BJP tweeted that dismantling the plaque, on which Deb was referred to as an official of the KMC, is tantamount to destruction of evidence.

It was installed on February 26 at a function organised by a local reading library but none of the dignitaries was present, the local TMC ward coordinator said.

Names of those leaders were included in the plaque without their knowledge, the ward coordinator claimed. The plaque was removed from the base of the bust and broken into fragments by KMC at the initiative of the ward coordinator.

A member of the KMC’s board of administrators, Atin Ghosh, said that no such programme was organised by the civic body. Senior TMC MLA from Baranagar Tapas Roy, whose name was there on the tablet denied having known Deb or any knowledge of the programme.

We were busy with election campaigning at that time.I have no idea how my name figured in the plaque,” Roy said. He said he lodged a complaint with the police in this regard. Another TMC MLA Nayna Bandyopadhyay also said she lodged a police complaint on the matter.

Senior minister and head of the KMC’s board of administrators Firhad Hakim said that many people whose identities are not known come close to political leaders to take selfies. “If any of them prepares a plaque and gets his name written on a plaque along with the names of me and others, does that mean we have any link with him? Please keep in mind that none of us was present there,” Hakim said.

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