Why Mugdha, Siddhartha on suspicion list, what police say

Rangpur Metropolitan DB Police has revealed why Mugdha Das and Siddhartha Chandra Das came into the police’s list of suspicion in the murder of Ganapati Chakrabarti and three members of his family in Kamalkachna Machuapara (Daspara) area of Rangpur metropolis. Alongside, several detailed pieces of information from before and after the arrest have come up citing locals.

Regarding on the basis of which information, how and why Mugdha and Siddhartha were arrested, Deputy Commissioner of Rangpur Metropolitan DB Police Sanatan Chakrabarti told Views Bangladesh, ‘Police have two types of sources for collecting information—digital and analogue. Although digital sources were not that active at the time of the incident, the analogue sources were active.’

He said, ‘Through that source police came to know that the day after the incident on Saturday Siddhartha Das shopped at various shops and made purchases with large denomination notes, especially 1,000-taka notes. Local shopkeepers and police sources knew that Siddhartha is not generally a person who spends 1,000-taka notes like this for shopping. From where so much money suddenly came into his hands—this matter became a cause of suspicion for the police.’

Sanatan Chakrabarti informed that some abnormality was also seen in Siddhartha’s behaviour and there was some rumour in the area over the matter. However he was not directly identified as a suspect before the recovery of the bodies. After the recovery of the four bodies police sources gave information about Siddhartha’s movements of the last two days, in which his movements appeared suspicious. After that on the basis of the information given by the source police first detained Siddhartha. During interrogation he was not admitting anything at first. Later on the basis of the information given by him Mugdha Das was also detained.

According to the statement of Sanatan Chakrabarti, after interrogation from morning to noon Mugdha Das gave important information on the basis of which police came to know that the looted jewellery has been kept at a specific place. Later the jewellery was recovered from that place and the relatives of the deceased family identified them as the jewellery of the Chakrabarti family. In this way the suspicion against Mugdha and Siddhartha was gradually confirmed and police advanced the investigation following the information received from them and the clue of the recovered jewellery, Sanatan Chakrabarti informed.

There are also several questions regarding the sequence of events before and after the arrest. According to police information, the four were killed around 6am on Friday (August 21) and the bodies were recovered from the house of Daspara around 11pm the next day on Saturday. In the dead of night on Saturday police went to Mugdha’s house to arrest him. The sound of knocking on the door woke his mother Sena Rani Das. When the door was opened and the presence of police was sensed Mugdha tried to escape through another door of the house, finally police detained him. Although his mother said Mugdha was at home the previous night on Thursday, she does not know whether he went out in the dead of night.

Siddhartha was not at his own house on Thursday night, he was at the border house of the same area. His father Binoy Chandra Das informed that his son occasionally used to stay at the border house, again he also used to stay at the house of uncle Bijoy Chandra Das. When police went to his house in the dead of night on Saturday to detain Siddhartha he was not found at first, later the father called him. The next morning police took him to the house of uncle Bijoy Chandra Das, where some jewellery and cash money were recovered in a state of being buried under sand under a coconut tree. Police claimed that Siddhartha himself had kept these things there. However uncle Bijoy Chandra Das informed that Siddhartha was at his house on Saturday night and occasionally used to stay there, but he does not know who buried the jewellery and money under sand.

Siddhartha’s elder brother Partha Chandra Das said if his brother was involved in the murder he would not normally stay there after the incident; however whether the brother is guilty will be proved in the court. His allegation is that there may be a bigger reason behind this murder and an attempt is being made to hide the main incident.

There is a under-construction house of Debu beside the house of Ganapati Chakrabarti, on the second floor of which lives retired teacher Heman Sukumar Mondal. He informed that he has never seen anyone taking drugs on the roof of their or Ganapati family’s house. He said, ‘The members of the Ganapati family did not mix much with others of the area, they used to live in their own way, for which the internal news of the family did not come outside.’ Locals think the killers may have used the roof of that under-construction house adjacent to Ganapati’s house as a path of movement.

The Daspara area is quite densely populated, as a result if a big incident happens in a house the surrounding residents get the opportunity to sense it. Several including Siddhartha’s brother Partha Chandra have raised the question why in such a densely populated area four members of the same family were killed, yet no scream-shout or any sound reached the ears of anyone nearby. The complainant of the case and Ganapati’s brother Gopinath Chakrabarti has also raised questions about the electricity connection of the house. His allegation is that the electricity connection of the house was disconnected from the pole before the murder. If the answer to why and who disconnected this connection is found the main reason of the murder will be known, he thinks. His statement is that it is not possible for two people to carry out such a big incident, there is a big circle behind it.