Kolkata Police justifies use of force against protesting teachers as ‘self-defence’  

Kolkata Police justify use of force against protesting teachers in Kasba, sparking controversy and conflicting narratives.

Kolkata Police Commissioner Manoj Kumar Verma and other senior police officials on Friday (April 11, 2025) justified the police’s action against protesting teachers, days after visuals emerged of police personnel baton-charging and attacking protestors during an agitation in south Kolkata’s Kasba.

In the visuals that emerged from a protest by aggrieved teachers at the Kasba office of the District Inspector of Schools on April 9, uniformed police personnel were seen beating protestors with batons, kicking, and pushing them.

Protestors were agitating against the cancellation by the Supreme Court of nearly 26,000 teaching and non-teaching job appointments in West Bengal over irregularities in recruitment. After the protest, they alleged severe injuries were inflicted by the police and cited multiple incidents where the police’s batons “broke” under the force of the lathi charge.

Two protestors were reportedly hospitalised after the clash.

On the contrary, multiple senior officials of Kolkata Police, including the Police Commissioner, stuck by their earlier claim that the use of ‘mild force’ was ‘necessary’ to disperse the allegedly unruly mob of protesting teachers and prevent them from damaging property.

The police also lodged an FIR against the protesting teachers under multiple sections of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) at the Kasba police station.

“Thirteen police personnel have been injured after protestors attacked them. One of them was hospitalised for three days. Another police personnel who was accused of attacking protestors sustained injuries in his groin area and chest. His ears were slapped, and his glasses were broken,” Mr. Verma said on Friday.