Agartala mission breached amid protest over B'desh

NEW DELHI: A large group of people protesting the persecution of the Hindu minority in Bangladesh barged into the Bangladesh consulate in Agartala and vandalized it on Monday, prompting New Delhi to describe the breach as "deeply regrettable" and step up security for all of the country's missions in India.

- Rezaul H Laskar

Authorities in Dhaka responded strongly to the incident, with its foreign ministry urging authorities in India to take steps to "prevent any further acts of violence against the diplomatic missions of Bangladesh".

With attacks on Hindus in Bangladesh and the arrest of Bangladeshi monk Chinmoy Krishna Das on sedition charges becoming hot button issues, West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee sought Prime Minister Narendra Modi's intervention in the matter on Monday and said the Indian government should seek the deployment of UN peacekeepers in Bangladesh. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) responded to her comments by saying she was shedding "crocodile tears".

Thousands of people joined a protest organised by the Hindu Sangharsh Samity in Agartala, the capital of Tripura, to voice their anger at the arrest of Das and violence against Hindus in Bangladesh. People familiar with the matter said on condition of anonymity that scores of protestors broke through police barricades and barged into Bangladesh's assistant high commission, ransacking property and raising alarm among Bangladeshi diplomats and officials.

The handful of Bangladeshi officials present at the premises were unharmed though the incident left them shaken, the people said.

"The incident earlier today of the breach of premises at the Bangladesh assistant high commission in Agartala is deeply regrettable," the external affairs ministry said in a brief statement.