Manas Jyoti Deka is the man who recently in the limelight after JNU’s Kanhaiya Kumar alleged that he tried to ‘strangle’ him on a Pune-bound Jet Airways flight from Mumbai, last week. Kumar promptly sent out a series of tweets chronicling his miseries after a fight between the two broke out over the alleged assault. He was convinced that it was all a conspiracy.
If the BJP connection seems all too convenient, let us tell you, it is. The case was that of mistaken identity. Kumar assumed that his assaulter was Manas Deka, a member of the National Security Cell of BJP.
Manas Deka, who was on the plane with Kumar, recounted the day to Firstpost:
Deka is a software engineer at Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) Kolkata, who was flying to Pune with 17 of his colleagues. They were shifting their base to Pune until May 27 due to the ongoing elections in West Bengal. When the plane stopped in Mumbai for half an hour, Deka moved out of his window seat to go speak with his friends in the plane. Kanhaiya Kumar then boarded the flight, and took the aisle seat in the same row.
Startled at his reaction, Deka offered a prompt apology, but in his words, “Kanhaiya would have none if it.”
Pretty high, actually. Even with both being software engineers from Assam- and possibly having the same political inclinations, the chances of two men sharing a name are very high in populous India.
The other Manas is justifiably annoyed. “I am not that Manas. I have had enough of this...I just want this matter closed,” he told Firspost. The BJP National Security Cell Coordinator was not even in Maharashtra on the day of the event. In another interview to Rediff.com, he clarified the air a little further: “The other Manas Deka is also a software engineer like me. I am a former IT engineer who works with the BJP at their Delhi office. Therefore, this added to the confusion.”
Even after the whole incident has come to life, Kanhaiya Kumar continues to voice anger and suspicion towards TCS’s Deka, who denies being a BJP supporter. In any case, he remarks to Firstpost, he was free to “like or dislike anything. It was his personal opinion.”
Understandably, Deka’s family fears for his safety as the TCS employee has already received “three to four threatening calls.” Speaking to Firstpost about his further course, TCS’s Deka pointedly says:
While the country keeps a casual tab on how this seemingly straightforward incident will ultimately play out, it may just be a case of ‘any press is good press’ for Kanhaiya Kumar.
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