KOLKATA: A 19-year-old student from a top English-medium school in Kolkata had claimed he was subjected to moral policing and assaulted by a group of men outside a park at BA Block in Salt Lake for sitting on a bench with a girl last Monday.
The local residents’ association has lodged a complaint at Bidhannagar North police station on Wednesday against the youth citing “unethical activities” by “outsiders”.
The youth, who has narrated his plight on social media, has told TOI he was just chatting with his friend after a round of cycling at 5.15am, when the caretaker of BA block community centre asked them to leave the spot and claimed their behaviour was indecent.
“When I protested, a local resident joined the caretaker, saying we were doing dirty things.
I protested again as others gathered around us.
One of them flung my bicycle in a drain while others began hitting me.
In self-defence, I pushed them away, as more people joined to abuse and beat me up.
Two men even appeared with an iron rod,” said the youth, a resident of Phoolbagan.
The girl had initially left but had come back after the youth called her for help.
However, the men were abusive towards her as well, he said.
“I had never felt more powerless before.
The rod hit me again, near my eye.
I grabbed it and snatched it away.
People pounced on me again and I stopped everyone saying I don’t want to hurt anyone, so please stop.
Thankfully by then, the police came and the hitting stopped as well,” the youth wrote on a social media page.
Residents of BA Block claimed the youth was sitting indecorously outside the park that led them to protest but refuted allegations of beating him up.
“He was sitting in such a manner with the girl that elderly residents in the area couldn’t bear to stand the sight.
We had just asked him to sit at a distance maintaining Covid protocol and he began abusing us.
The youth was extremely aggressive and had even pushed a senior citizen.
But we never beat him up,” said Subhendu Kundu, the secretary of BA Block residents’ association.
The youth added that someone had even called the local councillor Rajesh Chirimar but he allegedly asked the locals to continue the beating.
However, Chirimar denied the allegation.
“I told the men to call the cops or talk to the boy and ask him to leave.
If he had been assaulted, it is wrong.
But then he should have complained to police if indeed something like this happened.
I am ready to help the young man if required,” Chirimar said.
Officers from Bidhannagar North police station rescued the youth and later handed him over to his parents.
“The youth hasn’t lodged a complaint yet,” said a senior officer.
The officer added that local residents, however, lodged a complaint about unrestricted entry of outsiders in the area who engage in unethical activities.
Sociologists have described the incident as an example of moral policing borne out of generation gap, antipathy towards different sections of society and a sense of deep-rooted envy.
“Most elderly residents had never got the opportunity to hang out ad mix with the opposite gender in their puberty, the way today’s teenagers do.
They had always lived in a state of denial.
These instances of moral policing often get exposed when this sense of generation gap coupled with an underlying element of envy towards the liberty enjoyed by today’s teenagers may have prompted the attack as well.
The fact that the youth was not a Bengali could have flared the sentiments further,” said sociologist Prasanta Roy.