Kolkata, Oct 22 — A top officer from the Kolkata Police, on Thursday, revealed the identity of the person detained by the cops as a suspect of making the misleading announcement on a microphone, triggering panic among the devotees within the community Durga Puja pandal of Chorbagan Sarbojanin in North Kolkata on the night of October 17, leading to the stampede deaths of a total of 19 persons.
The detained person is Sanib Raha, a.k.a. Sentu, who was the treasurer of the organising committee for the community Durga Puja of Chorbagan Sarbojanin, the additional commissioner (crime) of Kolkata Police, Kunal Agarwal, confirmed.
According to him, Raha was arrested earlier in the day from Nadia district in West Bengal and brought to the city police headquarters of Lalbazar in Central Kolkata.
He is currently being questioned on what prompted him to make the misleading announcement triggering panic and whether he made the announcement on his own or as per instructions of anyone else.
Based on the findings of Raha’s investigation, the next legal steps in the matter will be taken.
The misleading announcement was made at a time when chaos had already started surfacing within the pandal because of the rains, with those outside trying to get inside the pandal to save themselves from the rain and those within the pandal refusing to go out for the same reason.
At that time, a misleading announcement was made, asking people to evacuate the pandal immediately for fear of the structure collapsing, triggering extreme panic and prompting the pilgrims to rush out, with some even moving towards the entry gate to exit, ultimately leading to the stampede.
Currently, two parallel probes into the stampede tragedy are being carried out. The first probe is by a special investigation team (SIT) of Kolkata Police, which is headed by an assistant commissioner-rank officer attached to the detective department (DD) of the city police.
The second probe is being conducted by a judicial probe panel, constituted by the state government, headed by Justice Anindita Roy Saraswati (retired).
The judicial panel is supposed to complete its investigation and submit a report to the state government within the next three months.