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Rizwanur’s neighbours vent ire at women’s panel team

By Indo-Asian News Service

Kolkata: A team of representatives from the West Bengal Women’s Commission (WBWC) Monday faced public ire when they went to meet Rizwanur Rahman’s grieving mother at their Tiljala Lane residence in central Kolkata.

Rizwanur’s neighbours waved black flags and shouted slogans, asking the eight-member team led by chairperson Jasodhara Bagchi to go back.

Holding placards like “You have become a stooge of the Todi family” and “Shame on you”, they wanted to know why the team had come almost 24 days after the youth’s death.

Trying to come to grips with her grief, a weeping Kishwar Jahan, Rizwanur’s mother, pleaded for justice before the WBWC team. “Please give us justice,” she mumbled for the umpteenth time.

“She pleaded that those who put pressure on Rizwanur to separate from his wife should be punished. We told her that we cannot punish anybody, but we would definitely convey her feelings at the right place,” Bagchi said.

Rizwanur, a 30-year-old computer graphic designer, was found lying dead beside a railway track here Sep 21 with his head smashed, barely a month after marrying a Hindu girl Priyanka Todi, daughter of industrialist Ashok Todi.

The WBWC team last week met Rizwanur’s wife Priyanka. Lending credence to the suicide theory propounded by the police, Priyanka reportedly told the team that she would have returned to her husband after reasoning with her parents to accept their marriage.

Ashok Todi and some senior IPS officers in the state are in the eye of a storm for allegedly intimidating the youth to opt out of the marriage.

Meanwhile, the Calcutta High Court Monday completed the hearing in the case related to Rizwanur’s death in mysterious circumstances.

“The hearing in the case has come to an end and we expect the high court to give its verdict Tuesday,” advocate Kalyan Bandopadhyay, who is fighting the legal battle on behalf of the victim’s family, told reporters.

He claimed the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) had no right to investigate the matter after the completion of the post-mortem analysis.

“The state government is deliberately trying to suppress the issue and dilute the importance of the case by destroying all evidences. We demand an independent inquiry by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI),” Bandopadhyay said, adding the state government was not doing justice to Rizwanur’s family.

State Home Secretary Prasad Ranjan Roy Monday said the state government was expecting the CID report before Durga puja.

“There is no problem in taking action against the guilty policemen before the CID report is received,” he said.

“Normally, it takes around six months to one and a half years to receive the viscera report. But in this case we have asked the authorities to expedite it,” the home secretary said.

He said the government would conduct a second post-mortem if the court ordered it.

Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee Sunday visited Rizwanur’s family and reiterated her demand for a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) inquiry into his mysterious death.

West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharya met Rizwanur’s mother Oct 13 at her residence and promised action against the policemen allegedly involved in the incident.

Earlier, Priyanka told the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) that she believed Rizwanur had committed suicide and that her parents were not responsible for the mysterious death.