The North 24 Parganas Zilla Parishad chairperson, Narayan Goswami, has written to the Barasat police district superintendent seeking security after an alleged attack on his vehicle and vandalism inside his office. Goswami said he had also been receiving death threats from unidentified people for the past two to three months.
According to the letter, Goswami was attacked on October 9 when six or seven masked people allegedly threw stones and eggs at his car inside the Zilla Parishad office premises. He was not injured in the incident, according to the report.
On Monday, October 12, a group of around 20 to 25 people allegedly entered the district council office and vandalised Goswami’s room. Documents kept in a cupboard were scattered, and office property was damaged. Goswami was not present at the time of the incident.
The chairperson said he later received a phone call containing a death threat. In his letter to the police superintendent, he requested an investigation into the incidents and asked that security arrangements be made for him. The report did not state whether the police had announced arrests or confirmed the identities of those involved.
Goswami, a former Trinamool Congress legislator, said the alleged vandalism had created an atmosphere of fear inside the office. He said employees would not be able to work properly if the premises did not remain peaceful and claimed that staff members did not recognise the people who entered the office.
“District council property is not my personal property. It is government property,” Goswami said, according to the report. He added that he expected action over any damage to public assets and said anyone with a grievance could have approached him directly instead of disrupting the office.
The incident has also triggered a political allegation. The Bharatiya Janata Party claimed that the attack was linked to factional tensions within the Trinamool Congress. The BJP further alleged that Goswami may have been in contact with another Trinamool faction and that this had angered the party leadership. The report did not provide independent confirmation of that allegation, and no response from the people accused of carrying out the vandalism was mentioned.
The reported incidents place a functioning district council office at the centre of a security and public-administration concern. The Zilla Parishad is a local government institution, and disruption to its premises can affect employees, records and routine administrative work. The immediate next steps are expected to depend on the police investigation and the security request submitted by Goswami.
