BJP's candidate Jay Prakash Majumdar heckled, CEO seeks report
Kolkata: Senior BJP leader and party's candidate for Karimpur Assembly by-poll Jay Prakash Majumdar was on Monday allegedly beaten up by TMC activists at Phipulkhola area of Nadia district when he was entering a polling booth.
TV footage showed Majumdar being beaten up and kicked by some people.
Holding TMC "goons" responsible for the act, he said, wounds will heal but the incident is a "clear" sign of the "end of democracy" in West Bengal.
The BJP leader alleged that the TMC activists were false voters who had assembled in the area with the intention of rigging polls.
"But it will not demoralise me and I will continue to visit all the booths. I have complained to the Election Commission," Majumdar, the vice president of the state unit of the BJP, said.
Denying the allegations as "baseless", the Nadia district unit of the TMC said, locals had attacked Majumdar as they were angry with him for "vitiating" the poll atmosphere.
The EC has sought reports about the incident. TMC MP Mohua Moitra declined to comment.
Besides Karimpur, by-polls are underway in Kharagpur Sadar and Kaliaganj Assembly seats. While Kharagpur Sadar and Karimpur seats were held by the TMC, Kaliaganj was represented in the Assembly by the Congress.
In Karimpur, vacated by MLA Mahua Moitra after emerging victorious from Krishnnanagar Lok Sabha seat, CPI(M)-Congress candidate Gholam Rabbi is contesting against Majumdar and TMC's Bimalendu Singha Roy.
The Kharagpur Sadar seat fell vacant as the sitting TMC MLA contested and won Lok Sabha seat. By-polls were necessitated in Kaliaganj following the death of Congress MLA Parmathanath Roy.
About 30.17 per cent of over seven lakh electorate exercised their franchise in the by-polls to the three Assembly seats till 11 am.
#WATCH West Bengal BJP Vice President and candidate for Karimpur bypoll, Joy Prakash Majumdar manhandled and kicked allegedly by TMC workers as voting is underway in the constituency. #WestBengal pic.twitter.com/Vpb5s14M5A
— ANI (@ANI) November 25, 2019
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Trump says Islamic State group leader was killed in joint US-Nigerian mission
Washington (AP): President Donald Trump said US and Nigerian forces killed a leader of the Islamic State group in Nigeria in a mission carried out Friday.
Trump announced the joint operation in a late-night social media post that offered few details. He said Abu Bakr al-Mainuki was second in command of the Islamic State group globally and “thought he could hide in Africa, but little did he know we had sources who kept us informed on what he was doing.”
The US viewed Al-Mainuki as the key figure in IS organising and finance, and believed he was plotting attacks against the United States and its interests, according to an official who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorised to share sensitive information.
Born in Nigeria's Borno province in 1982, al-Mainuki took the helm of the IS branch in West Africa after the group's previous leader in the region, Mamman Nur, was killed in 2018, according to the Counter Extremism Project, which tracks militant groups.
Al-Mainuki was based in the Sahel area, the monitoring group said, adding that it is believed that he fought in Libya when IS was active in the North African nation more than a decade ago. He was sanctioned by the US in 2023.
Trump in December directed US forces to launch strikes against the Islamic State group in Nigeria, though he released little detail then about the impact.
Nigeria has been battling multiple armed groups, including at least two affiliated with IS.
The Friday night operation was the latest instance in a string of covert missions abroad that Trump has announced this year, starting with the stunning overnight raid in January to capture and remove Venezuela's then-leader Nicolás Maduro and whisk him to the US, followed nearly two months later by the launch of strikes that kicked off the war with Iran.
