Raiganj, Jan. 7: The Trinamul leader accused of leading the attack on the Raiganj College principal on Thursday surrendered in court this afternoon following "instructions from Mamata Banerjee" and was given bail. Tilak Chowdhury, Trinamul's North Dinajpur working president, reached the chief judicial magistrate's court in Raiganj with his lawyers and supporters around noon. He was released on bail on a surety of Rs 700 and told to appear before the court on February 6. The principal of Raiganj College, Dilip Dey Sarkar, had named Chowdhury as the main accused in his FIR. Trinamul sources said Mamata was "keen to convey" the message that her government was not partisan. "The chief minister instructed Trinamul leaders to ask Chowdhury to surrender so that it did not appear that the party and the government were protecting him," a source said. "The administration was getting into an embarrassing situation as Chowdhury was roaming around openly." At a media conference at Writers' this afternoon, Mamata said: "The guilty will be arrested irrespective of party colours." After Chowdhury was granted bail, around 150 Trinamul workers surrounded him and shouted slogans in his support. He told the crowd and the media that the Congress had brought "false charges" against him. "We have been framed by the Congress and its leader Deepa Das Munshi (the Congress MP from Raiganj). We had gone to the college on Thursday to submit a memorandum to the principal for being biased," Chowdhury said. He claimed no Trinamul leader or worker was involved in vandalising the college and assaulting the principal. "It was the handiwork of Congress and Chhatra Parishad workers. We will file a suit against Deepa Das Munshi for instigating the violence." Das Munshi said Chowdhury's allegations were "baseless". "I won't comment on such baseless allegations. I was not in Raiganj when the incident took place." In Calcutta, Mamata blamed the principal for the flare-up. "For four days, Trinamul Chhatra Parishad members were locked up and assaulted. They were not allowed to file nominations (for college union elections). This is what the SFI had done all these years. Had the college authorities acted in a strict and impartial manner, the incident would not have happened. He (Dey Sarkar) had sided with a particular political party," she said. She said local Trinamul leaders had gone to the college to "rescue" the student wing members and criticised the police for letting the situation get out of hand. "If someone from a family has been locked up, other members will try to rescue him. They fell into a trap. The police should have intervened but didn't do so…. It was a failure on the part of the police," she said. The chief minister also alleged that "a section of officers in charge of police stations were CPM agents". | 
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