KOLKATA: Former Trinamool Congress MLA Nirmal Ghosh and former party councillor Sanjib Mukherjee were attacked by protesters while shouting “chor, chor” and hurled eggs while being taken to the Barrackpore court in North 24 Parganasin connection with the RG Kar rape and murder case on Friday. Some protesters carried garlands made of shoes.
Police on Thursday arrested the two for their alleged role in the rushed cremation of the body of the 31-year-old postgraduate trainee doctor who was raped and murdered at RG Kar Medical College and Hospital in August 2024.
West Bengal Police arrested Ghosh from Puri in Odisha on Thursday, while Mukherjee was arrested in Kolkata. The arrests followed an FIR registered at Khardah police station against Ghosh, Mukherjee and former Panihati Municipality councillor Somnath Dey on Monday.
The FIR was registered after the victim’s parents alleged that the three men had forced the family to cremate the body hurriedly to destroy or conceal evidence.
According to police, Ghosh had fled to Odisha to avoid arrest and had started using a new SIM card and mobile phone while keeping his old phone inactive. Police tracked his mobile tower location and found that he was staying at a hotel in Puri, where a team subsequently arrested him.
Ghosh, Dey and Mukherjee have been charged with criminal trespass, wrongful restraint, criminal intimidation, causing disappearance of evidence, trespass on burial places, disobeying law by a public servant to save a person or property, preparing an incorrect record by a public servant, criminal conspiracy and common intention. The offences carry punishments of up to seven years in jail.
Police said the victim’s family alleged that the three accused entered their home on August 9, 2024, and pressured and threatened her father and other relatives to take the body for cremation immediately.
The body was allegedly taken from RG Kar Medical College and Hospital to the Panihati crematorium against the father’s wishes, without giving the family enough time to pay their last respects.
“Accordingly, the cremation was deliberately rushed under political influence, possibly to prevent a second post-mortem and to destroy or conceal evidence,” a Barrackpore commissionerate officer said.
The case was registered after Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari announced on Sunday that the state would investigate alleged irregularities surrounding the cremation.
“The rape and murder... and the financial irregularity in the hospital are under the purview of the court-monitored CBI investigation. There is not much scope for the state to investigate there. But I have found one area that the state can still investigate,” Suvendu had said.
He said the state would investigate, under the Special Commission Act, allegations related to the Panihati crematorium where the doctor was cremated.
