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Kanhaiya Has Put Family Under Duress: TCS’ Manas Deka Speaks Up

TCS’s Manas Deka recounts the day he did not strangle Kanhaiya Kumar, and became an extra in a publicity stunt. 

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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.

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Will the Real Manas Deka Please Stand up?

Manas Deka, who was on the plane with Kumar, recounted the day to Firstpost:

I was in the window seat while this guy (Kanhaiya Kumar) was in the aisle seat. Kanhaiya and 12-13 other boys were there in the group and they had boarded the flight in Mumbai. It so happened that when I was coming out from the seat my hand touched Kanhaiya’s shoulder. I am suffering from a boil in my thigh and it gets extremely painful when the area hits something. I was quite careful not to hurt it. In the process, since it’s a cramped area my hands touched Kanhaiya’s shoulder. He immediately reacted saying that I was going to kill him and in non time turned the whole situation into a drama. 

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.”

Immediately all his friends surrounded me and threatened me with dire consequences. If you seen the clip there was one guy in a while shirt. He became so aggressive that I felt that he was going to rain blows soon after. Very soon, it snowballed into a heated altercation. As soon as the fight escalated, the CISF and police were called into the aircraft. When they asked my name I told them it was Manas Jyoti Deka. Someone from Kanhaiya’s group might have googled it immediately when the name of BJP’s Manas Deka had probably appeared. That’s how the wrong Manas Deka of the BJP in all likelihood came into the picture. They did not have the time to ascertain the facts in their zeal to pin me down. 
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What Are The Odds?

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.

If Kanhaiya Kumar is such a big leader as he thinks he is, he should have some common sense. Can’t there be many individuals with the same name? He claims to be a student but he is too much into politics.
Manas Deka, TCS Employee

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.”

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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:

Because of Kanhaiya and his group, my whole family is tense. My parents, my brother and sister are all crying because they fear harm to me. They are extremely worried. He has put my family in so much distress. I will soon file a case against him. I am not alone. All my colleagues and my friends are behind me.

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.

(At The Quint, we are answerable only to our audience. Play an active role in shaping our journalism by becoming a member. Because the truth is worth it.)

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Topics:  Kanhaiya Kumar   JNU Row 

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