In an embarrassment to Mamata Banerjee, her party MLA Shikha Mitra today hailed villagers who protested during the visit of the Chief Minister to the family of a college girl 10 days after she was brutally raped and killed in North 24 Parganas district.
"I salute the villagers of Kamuduni who dared to protest during Mamata Banerjee's visit," Mitra said, referring to the protests by women of the village on June 17 following the rape and murder of the girl on June 7.
"This protest was very necessary in Bengal. The chief minister herself being a woman should have been more sensible toward the concerns of women," Mitra said.
On the chief minister having labelled the women as 'Maoists' and 'CPI(M) supporters', Mitra said, "I don't know on what basis innocent villagers were labelled as Maoists as they dared to question the chief minister.
"This tendency of labelling innocent people as Maoists is not right," she said.
Meanwhile, the Park Street rape victim, whose case was earlier termed as 'concocted' by Banerjee, visited the family of the girl and expressed her support.
