Mystery Surrounds Death of TMC Panchayat Member in Jamalpur

A member of the Trinamool Congress (TMC) panchayat, Shubhendu Mallik was discovered dead in a pond near his house. The finding was appalling to the people of Itla village of the Purba Bardhaman district Jamalpur block. On Sunday, December 1, 2025, the incident was revealed, and the community has been torn between the possibility of the murder and the accident.

Mallik was a 42 year old member of the Paratal-2 Gramme Panchayat and also a paddy trader leaving his house on a motorbike on Saturday afternoon. He did not come back before nightfall, and his phone was switched off when a call was made several times to see him. On Sunday morning his family was going to file a missing-person report when his body was found in a pond near his house.

The scene brings out queries that propagate scepticism. The motorbike Mallik was riding was located in the pond, but his slippers were well organised on the shore. This was queer to Supriya Das, his brother-in-law, who thought that had the accident been accidental, the slippers would not have been put so neatly. This fact has added to the panic that Mallik is a murder victim.

The tip-off was immediately followed by the local police. They took the body to be post-mortem at Bardhaman Hospital and took the motorbike on investigation. The police are covering every twist and both murder and accident are possibilities. Block TMC president Mehemud Khan was shocked by the situation and said that this enveloped it with mystery and should be investigated completely. Mallik is a family of his old parents, his wife and a son who is a secondary-school exam candidate.

The incident is part of a cloud of political unrest in West Bengal where there have been debates and other killings attributed to the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of the electoral roll. TMC leaders point the blame on the central government and the Election Commission because they claim that the SIR process has caused stress and deaths. The BJP has labelled such allegations as political theatrics, and indicated that there have been internal party disputes or personal disputes, which have caused some of the deaths but not the SIR process itself. The case of Mallik’s murder is still under investigation and the precise cause is yet to be established.