Silchar, April 29 : A Congress leader and his brother were hospitalised in a critical condition after being attacked at their residence in Assam’s Cachar district in the wee hours today.
Police suspect the attackers were mostly slum-dwellers living near Congress leader Partha Chakrabarty’s three-storey building in Tarapur here.
Police sources said the slum-dwellers, belonging to the Kaibartya sub-caste of the Hindus, swooped down on Chakrabarty’s house, broke open the gate and the doors to his drawing room and bedroom around 4am.
When Chakrabarty, 46, and his younger brother Sujoy confronted the intruders, the goons pounced on them with daggers, scythes and spears and inflicted wounds on the back of their heads and shoulders.
The gang vandalised the house, damaging TV sets, musical gadgets and sofa sets. Hearing the commotion, Chakrabarty’s neighbours rushed to his rescue.
The gang escaped through the labyrinth of lanes and bylanes near Chakrabarty’s residence while the neighbours rushed the brothers, who were lying in a pool of blood, to the Silchar Medical College and Hospital. Both have been admitted to the intensive care unit.
Doctors at the hospital said the brothers’ condition was “stable”. They will be under observation for at least three days.
The attack on Chakrabarty, who is the general secretary of Cachar district Congress committee, chairman of Silchar Development Authority and a trusted aide of Union minister and Congress heavyweight in Assam Sontosh Mohan Dev, has triggered panic in the district.
Cachar superintendent of police Prashanta Bhuyan said the police had registered a case and launched a full-scale investigation into the cause of the attack.
