Hindu key witness to Sandeshkhali atrocities on Hindu women targeted in attempted murder

Case ID : 45f50c9 | Location : North 24 Parganas district, West Bengal, India | Date of Incident : Tue, 9 December, 2025

Case ID : 45f50c9

North 24 Parganas district, West Bengal, India

9 December, 2025

Hindu key witness to Sandeshkhali atrocities on Hindu women targeted in attempted murder

Attack not resulting in death

Attacked for opposing radicals or trying to save victim

Case Summary

In West Bengal, Hindu witness Bholanath Ghosh of the Sandeshkhali mass gang-rape of selectively Hindu women by Sheikh Shahjahan, a Muslim politician of Trinamool Congress, was targeted with attempted murder. According to media reports, on 10th December 2025, Bholanath Ghosh, a key witness in the case against Trinamool Congress leader Sheikh Shahjahan from West Bengal’s Sandeshkhali, suffered severe injuries in a road accident. His younger son and the driver died in the accident. Ghosh was on his way to testify against Shahjahan in court. The injured witness’s family stated that it was not an accident but a deliberate conspiracy to kill Ghosh. His car was hit by a ten-wheeler truck, and the truck driver fled the scene following the accident. Police said they were looking for the driver. Biswajit Ghosh, the elder brother of Bholanath Ghosh, stated that it was not an accident, but a conspiracy orchestrated at Sheikh Shahjahan’s behest to kill the witness. Biswajit added that Shahjahan earlier attempted to have his father killed. He said, “They had threatened to kill my father earlier. This is not an accident, 100% murder. Shahjahan’s order was carried out by Sabita Roy and Muslim Sheikh.” Amidst the statements of the victim’s family and social media chatter about the timing of Ghosh’s accident, the police said, “We are not sure if it was an accident. We are probing every angle. We are putting more emphasis on why the collision occurred where there is no CCTV coverage, and how the driver fled the scene.” In a major development confirming the conspiracy angle, police arrested two men for their role in the staged crash aimed at eliminating Bholanath Ghosh. The arrested accused were Uttam Sardar, a Trinamool Congress zilla parishad member and close aide of Sheikh Shahjahan, and Ruhul Kuddus Sheikh. Both were produced before a Basirhat court and remanded to nine days of police custody under Section 61(2) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita for criminal conspiracy. Investigators stated that although neither accused was named in the original FIR filed by Ghosh, material evidence collected during the probe established their involvement. Police sources revealed that Ruhul Kuddus Sheikh was assigned to monitor Ghosh’s daily movements and was present on the road on the day of the incident, following Ghosh’s vehicle until the fatal crash occurred. Uttam Sardar allegedly passed on critical information regarding the scheduled court hearing in the Sheikh Shahjahan case, which prompted Ghosh’s journey to Basirhat on the day of the attack. Despite these arrests, none of the eight individuals originally named by Ghosh in his complaint have been arrested, and the truck driver remained at large. Notably, Sheikh Shahjahan of Trinamool Congress was arrested by the Central Bureau of Investigation in 2024 in connection with the attack on an Enforcement Directorate team that went to question him in January 2024. Sheikh Shahjahan, a close aide of Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, conducted land grabbing and sexual assault against several Hindu women, selectively in Sandeshkhali. He was arrested by the state police on 29th February 2024, and the Central Bureau of Investigation took him into its custody on 6th March 2024. Shahjahan’s arrest followed after hundreds of Hindu women in Sandeshkhali of North 24 Parganas district in West Bengal held massive protests in February 2024, demanding action against him and two other Trinamool Congress workers, Shibu Prasad Hazra and Uttam Sardar. The Hindu women came out on the streets with brooms, sticks and farming tools and blocked the roads. These women stated that married Hindu women from the area were picked up, based on how young and pretty they were, and were violated night after night by Shahjahan’s men. The husbands of these women were also threatened and told that they had no “right” over their wives. If they attempted to stop the exploitation of the women, they were mercilessly beaten. Following this, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee downplayed the plight of the Hindu women. However, Sheikh Shahjahan and other accused persons were arrested.

Why it is Hate Crime ?

The primary category selected in this case is- Attack not resulting in death. The subcategory selected is- Attacked for opposing radicals or trying to save victim. In several cases, Hindus are attacked for opposing religiously motivated crimes being committed against a fellow Hindu or simply for voicing an opinion opposing radical elements, who either have in the past or continue to persecute Hindus. In such cases, the initial attack against the victim, against which the Hindu was trying to defend the victim, would also need to be classified as a religiously motivated hate crime. Since the initial crime itself was religiously motivated and the subsequent crime of attempting to save the victim or speaking against the radical elements ends up inviting a violent attack, it would also be classified as a religiously motivated hate crime under this category. This case constituted a clear instance of anti-Hindu hate crime, involving a targeted attack on Hindu key witness Bholanath Ghosh, directly linked to the Sandeshkhali mass gang-rapes of Hindu women. Bholanath Ghosh, central to the legal proceedings against Trinamool Congress leader Sheikh Shahjahan, met with what appeared as an accident en route to testify in court on 10th December 2025. His family asserted that this was no accident but a deliberate attempt to kill him, executed at Sheikh Shahjahan's behest. Under the Hinduphobia Tracker framework, absent such explicit statements from the victim's family, the incident would have entered the "Undecided" database. Here, however, Bholanath Ghosh's family confirmed the attempted killing stemmed from Shahjahan's orders, tying it to prior anti-Hindu crimes and exposing deep-seated religious animosity against the Hindu community. They further revealed that Sheikh Shahjahan had previously targeted Bholanath's father for murder, underscoring the premeditated religious hostility driving these acts. To grasp why this qualifies as an anti-Hindu hate crime, consider the Sandeshkhali atrocities. Sheikh Shahjahan, a Muslim Trinamool Congress politician, and his aides orchestrated mass gang-rapes and sexual exploitation targeting Hindu women exclusively. They profiled victims by their Hindu identity, dragging them to the Trinamool Congress office for serial assaults, brutal rapes, and degradation on a daily basis. These were not isolated sexual crimes but calculated tools of collective humiliation against the Hindu community and its men, achieved by violating Hindu women solely for being Hindu. The deliberate religious profiling and systematic brutality cemented these rapes as religiously motivated hate crimes, fuelled by profound hostility towards Hindus and their faith. Set against this backdrop, the assault on Hindu key witness Bholanath Ghosh amplified the anti-Hindu violence. By choosing to testify against Sheikh Shahjahan and champion Hindu women victimised in these religiously profiled rapes, Ghosh posed an immediate threat to the perpetrators' impunity. His family pinpointed the court-bound attack as a murder attempt at Shahjahan's direction, proving that Hindus who challenge such religiously driven crimes face elimination. This strike on Ghosh extended beyond one man; it aimed to muzzle Hindu voices resisting Muslim radicals like Sheikh Shahjahan, who preyed on Hindu women due to their religion. Patterns in prior cases confirm that Hindus defending fellow Hindu victims from Muslim radicals invariably suffer targeted attacks, as seen here, revealing entrenched religious animosity. This incident stood as a clear, religiously motivated crime against Hindu witness Bholanath Ghosh, extending the original Sandeshkhali anti-Hindu hate crimes. Consequently, the case is being added to the Hinduphobia Tracker's hate crime database.