KOLKATA: West Bengal Police is under all-round criticism following its failure to track five youths accused in the death of dancer and event management professional Sutandra Chattopadhyay early on Monday morning.
The young woman died in a road accident while making a desperate bid to escape the drunk and aggressive men, even as they chased her vehicle on the National Highway.
The accident took place when the driver of the car in which Sutandra Chattopadhyay was travelling increased speed and took evasive action to save her from the drunk youths chasing their car in another vehicle.
In that process the vehicle in which the victim was travelling overturned at the National Highway near Panagarh in West Burdwan district which led to her death on the spot, while the accused youths fled leaving their car on the accident site.
With no arrests in sight even 48 hours after the accident, criticism against the state investigating officials is piling up, both from the Opposition parties as well as civil society.
Questions are being raised as to why the police are unable to track even one of the youths despite the vehicle in which they were travelling being in the possession of the cops and the investigating officials obviously being aware of the identity of the owner of the vehicle.
The Opposition parties are drawing a parallel with the ghastly R.G. Kar Hospital rape and murder tragedy.
They are claiming that the police's inability to track the accused youth is prompted by their intention of shielding them because of the influential links of the latter.
Meanwhile, sources from the state police said that the investigating officials have got specific information that Bablu Yadav, the owner of the vehicle in which the accused youths were travelling, was himself driving the vehicle when the mishap took place.
The investigating officials hope to track him at the earliest and present him in court. Yadav is a businessman by profession.
Meanwhile the death of the victim has left her mother Tanushree Chattopadhyay, who lost her husband last year, totally shattered.
She has also accused the police of deliberately trying to shield the accused youths in the case.