Swapan Dasgupta locked up in Visva Bharati: Bharatiya Janata Party Rajya Sabha MP Swapan Dasgupta, Vice Chancellor Bidyut Chakraborty and several others were locked up by students of Visva Bharati in West Bengal’s Santiniketan on Wednesday evening. Dasgupta was invited at the university to deliver a lecture on “The CAA-2019: Understanding and Interpretation” .

However, students belonging to left affiliated Students Federation of India (SFI) disrupted the lecture shouting slogans. They staged a sit-in outside the main entrance of the building where the event was being held and didn’t allow Dasgupta and others to leave.

The ‘siege’ which began at 4 pm finally ended at 10 pm when the agitating students were persuaded by the university administration.

“There are nearly 70 people locked inside a room in Vishwa Bharati, Santiniketan, for the crime of attending an official, university-convened lecture by me on CAA. This includes the VC. There is a howling mob outside itching for confrontation,” Dasgupta had posted on Twitter.

BJP general secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya also tweeted a video warning the West Bengal government of serious consequences if anything happens to Dasgupta. “Swapan Dasgupta has been gheraoed by the goons of the SFI and TMC. He is inside. The police is nowhere to be seen. The life and honour of Swapan Dasgupta are very important,” Vijayvargiya was seen saying in his video.

West Bengal Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar also expressed concern over the situation at Santiniketan and said he has asked DGP Virendra Kumar to take immediate steps to ensure safety of Dasgupta and others confined by the protesting students. “Such anarchy and failure of law and order is worrisome,” the Governor said in his tweet.

Bengal has witnessed violent protests over the issues of Citizenship (Amendment) Act and National Register of Citizens (NRC). Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has been insisting that she won’t allow NRC to be carried out in Bengal.