Kolkata: Three relatives of the couple lynched in Bengal’s Nadia district on Saturday over suspicion of murdering their neighbour’s eight-year-old son were arrested on Sunday, police officials aware of the investigation said.
A villager, identified as Soumyajit Biswas, was also arrested on Sunday for the lynching in which police registered a seperate suo motu case.
Police officials said the kidnapping and murder of the child is being probed on the basis of a complaint by his father, Satyen Biswas, who told the local media that he had no enmity with his neighbours. The post mortem report said the boy was strangulated.
Utpal Mondal, 45, an e-rickshaw driver, and his wife Soma Mondal, 38, were lynched by some residents of Nisichintapur-Battalapara village in Nadia’s Tehatta police station area on Saturday, soon after the body of the minor son of their neighbour Satyen Biswas, an electrician, was found in a pond.
The boy went missing on Friday afternoon. The villagers accused Utpal Mondal of kidnapping him for ransom after the body was found on Saturday. They alleged that Mondal kidnapped two minor children earlier as well. Police said no such complaint was filed.
“No evidence of Mondal’s involvement in any kidnapping in the past has been found so far. We are trying to find the motive behind this boy’s murder,” a police officer said, requesting anonymity.
On Sunday, police arrested the wife of Mondal’s elder son, who is a migrant worker living in Bengaluru. She was injured during the mob attack and admitted to a hospital. Mondal’s younger son and his wife were also arrested.
A section of the local people told the media that Utpal Mondal and his wife had gone to hospital with their ailing younger son on Friday afternoon when the boy went missing. This is being verified by the police.
The mob also set fire to the property of Mondal’s maternal uncle Kartick Biswas, who lives in the same neighbourhood. This arson is also under scanner as Kartick Biswas and his family were not present in the village when the crime took place.
