The Trinamool Chhatra Parishad (TMCP) on Monday expelled its leader who allegedly set on fire a portrait of Nobel Laureate Rabindranath Tagore as well as those of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah.

The purported incident took place during a demonstration in Chanchal sub-division of Malda district.

The protesters first set on fire the posters of PM Modi and Amit Shah after which AB Soyel, the now expelled TMCP leader, also lit fire to Rabindranath Tagore’s photo, it is learnt.

The incident sparked a political controversy in Bengal.

TMCP president Trinankur Bhattacharya said in a statement, “We are always respectful towards our culture, heritage and intellectuals. We will not tolerate any misdeed that goes against our organisation’s ethics and policies. Our fight against the anti-Bengali BJP will continue.”

He added, “The TMCP’s Chanchal college unit was on Sunday staging a demonstration against the Army action on TMC’s dharna manch in Kolkata. During the protest they set Modi and Shah’s pictures on fire. But AB Soyel mistakenly set Tagore’s photograph on fire. When others saw it, they tried to extinguish the fire on Tagore’s photograph.”

Earlier in the day, the BJP on Monday staged a protest in Kolkata, with leaders and workers carrying posters of Rabindranath Tagore, accusing the TMC of disrespecting Bengal’s cultural icons and silencing dissent. The protest was held outside Rabindra Sadan, a government auditorium named after the Nobel Laureate poet.

Led by Leader of Opposition Suvendu Adhikari, the saffron party supporters marched to the gates of Rabindra Sadan in central Kolkata but were prevented from entering.

Adhikari said, “Everywhere there are locks — locks on industries, locks on democracy, locks on gates. Even Rabindra Sadan has been locked to keep us out. Is this Mamata Banerjee’s personal property, bought with Trinamool’s family money?” The BJP workers declared themselves “Rabindrapremi” (devotees of Tagore) and vowed to continue peaceful protests.

“We will neither break locks nor jump gates, but we will protest,” Adhikari said, alleging that several artistes and others were stopped from joining the agitation.

BJP state president Samik Bhattacharya sharpened the attack, terming the act “jihadi mindset”.

“On the soil of Tagore, his portrait is being set on fire. What can be more disastrous? We have seen such acts in Bangladesh. The ancestral house of Satyajit Ray and many other greats were vandalised, and libraries were set ablaze. The same picture is now visible in Malda’s Chanchal,” he said.

Bhattacharya alleged that the “language of protest” in border districts had become identical to that of Bangladesh.

The TMC dismissed the charges as “cheap theatrics” by the BJP to distract from its own failures in the state.

—PTI inputs