Guwahati, July 4: In what can be described as a never-before instance, a popular state-level leader of the Communist Party of India (CPI) has succumbed to injuries after he was severely assaulted by the police at Morigaon three days ago.

Manoj Deka, 54, who sustained severe injuries on his head and chest after he was beaten up by a constable Rafiqul Islam in the main road of Morigaon town on July 1 in the presence of Kamal Bora, officer in-charge of the Morigaon town police station, breathed his last at the GNRC Hospital here on Friday after struggling with life and death for three days.

Deka was a state executive member of the CPI and secretary of the CPI Morigaon district committee. A well-known citizen of the small district town, Deka was beaten up by the constable at a barricade the police had put up in the heart of the town to check vehicles and passers-by.

“It is a case of murder and part of a greater conspiracy hatched by the ruling (Congress) party to annihilate popular leaders of the opposition. Otherwise how could an ordinary constable not recognise a senior political leader and well-known resident of the small town, and that too in the presence of the OC?” asked Pramode Gogoi, former minister and a national council member of the CPI.

While the incident has already raked up a major controversy about police atrocities under the Tarun Gogoi regime, the government, as an immediate reaction, ordered the arrest of constable Islam and placed OC Kamal Bora under suspension. A magisterial inquiry has been ordered into the incident.

Opposition parties including the CPI, CPI(M), AGP and BJP however rejected the magisterial probe, saying it was only an eyewash. “We demand a high-level judicial inquiry headed by a sitting judge of the High Court,” said CPI leader Pramode Gogoi. Leader of the Opposition in the state assembly Chandra Mohan Patowari too has asked for a judicial probe into the incident.

Commenting on the incident, former chief minister Prafulla Kumar Mahanta said Deka’s death was yet another example to prove the ground situation in Assam under the Congress-led Government.

“This incident is enough to prove how basic rights of the citizens have been curtailed in Assam under the Congress-BPF Government. The Congress is out to throttle the opposition. It is a major threat to democracy too because the incident has occurred under the direct patronage and encouragement of the ruling party,” Mahanta said.

The Assam Human Rights Commission has registered a case following a petition filed by the district unit of the CPI. The district CPI unit in Morigaon has called a dawn-to-dusk bandh on Saturday.