A 23-member team of poll strategist Prashant Kishor's Indian Political Action Committee (I-PAC) has been let off its 'house arrest', hours after it was allegedly held inside a hotel by the Tripura police.
The team was in the state doing groundwork for the Trinamool Congress (TMC) ahead of the 2023 state Assembly elections.
The team members were held at Hotel Woodland Park in capital Agartala, and were interrogated and warned by the police not to leave the hotel except for going to the airport to leave the state, sources cited by news agency ANI had said on Monday, 26 July.
Sources claimed that one of the members of the team had been summoned to a police station on the morning of Monday and told that it would be best if they were to leave. Later that afternoon, police called a medical team to the hotel to conduct RT-PCR tests for all the team members.
Late on Monday, West Tripura SP Manik Das was quoted as saying by ANI, "The results of their (I-PAC members) RT-PCR test will come tomorrow. They said they were here for some research-related work that is being investigated. After getting the COVID test results and outcome of the probe, a decision will be taken on their release."
Meanwhile, the TMC in a statement said that all 23 members of the team tested negative for COVID-19.
TMC Leaders to Visit Tripura
A three-member delegation of TMC leaders, including Bratya Basu, Moloy Ghatak and Ritabrata Banerjee, is scheduled to visit Tripura on Wednesday, ANI reported.
Meanwhile, speaking to the media in Delhi on Tuesday, West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee said, "Lok Sabha elections are in 2024, but we have to plan from now. There are elections in states like Punjab, UP, Gujarat, Rajasthan and Tripura coming up. Yesterday, the government put our boys under house arrest in Tripura."
'Democracy in This Nation Dies a Thousand Deaths'
In order to strengthen its base in Tripura, the TMC had recently appointed Ashish Lal Singh as the party president in the state. Singh is also the son of Sachindra Lal Singh, the first chief minister of Tripura.
“This is shameful. The I-PAC team came and from night they are undergoing verification and they are almost in house arrest," Singh had said earlier, News18 reported.
Meanwhile, TMC's Abhishek Banerjee had said in a tweet, "Democracy in this nation dies a thousand deaths under BJP's misrule!"
I-PAC, meanwhile, had been quoted as saying earlier, “Our people have been literally put under house arrest for what reason we don’t know. We are looking into the matter."
‘Precautionary Measure’: Police
West Tripura SP Das had been quoted as saying, “Yesterday evening, we got information that 20 to 22 people from various parts of the country were staying in Woodland Park hotel. Accordingly, we inquired into the matter and found that some of them came on 20 July and others on 21 July", Outlook reported.
He added, “During one week, they visited various places of the state and met many people. So as a precautionary measure today morning, we have arranged RT-PCR tests and as per protocol they are staying in their present place of stay till receipt of their test results.”
(With inputs from News18)
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