City police form SIT to probe IAF officer’s death case

The Kolkata Police has formed a Special Investigation team (SIT) on Thursday to probe into the incident in which an Air Force officer was killed on Wednesday after being hit by a car during the rehearsal of the Republic Day parade on Red Road. A look out notice has also been issued against the accused, his father and brother, who were at large since the incident took place. 

It may be mentioned that the youth Ambia Sohrab, who is suspected to have been driving the car, is son of former RJD MLA Md Sohrab. On Thursday, police conducted a raid at their residence in Jorasanko and found the passport of Md Sohrab’s younger son Sambia. 

The police are yet to arrest the accused even after a day of the incident. Suspecting that the accused have fled to some other districts to escape getting arrested, a look out notice for all three has been issued. It will restrict them to fly out of the country and security agencies at ports and airports will intercept them if they take an attempt to flee.

At the same time a SIT headed by the deputy commissioner (II) of the detective department Nagendra Tripathi has been formed to probe into the incident. The team is comprised of police officers from various sections of the city police’s detective department including Homicide Section and Anti-Rowdy Squad. 

It may be mentioned that stating the incident that led to the death of Corporal Abhimanyu Gaud as an unfortunate one, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had directed the police to take stringent action against the accused.  

The investigation to ascertain the total number of persons in the car during the accident is on, but police suspect that there was more than one person in the vehicle when it hit the Air Force officer. Contradicting the version of the Kolkata Police, a spokesperson of the Defence claimed that Air Force Police and Army Police have jointly initiated a parallel investigation, which is quite normal in such cases, and the investigation revealed that there was only one person in the car. 

The investigating officers of the Defence have spoke to the eye witnesses and gathered information. The spokesperson said: “We have no difference in opinion with the city police. They are expert in their job as we are in ours. Thus we are helping the city police by providing whatever information our investigating officers are gathering.” 

“A probe to identify the lapses that allowed the incident of this magnitude to happed is also going on,” the spokesperson said.   

Meanwhile, to bid farewell to Corporal Abhimanyu Gaud a funeral parade was conducted in Command Hospital in the wee hours today. A team comprised of Army and Air Force personnel conducted the parade. Family members of Gaud including his father Ranglal Gaud, uncle Shri Nebulal Gaud and brother Bajrangi Gaud were present in the Command Hospital. Gaud’s childhood teacher Yogesh Parik was also present

The wreath on behalf of the Chief of the Air Staff was placed by Air Commodore M Rawat, the officiating Air Officer Commanding of the Advance Headquarters, Eastern Air Command. Senior officers of the Indian Army, Indian Air Force and Kolkata Police placed wreaths on Gaud’s coffin. 

Corporal’s body was taken to the Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose International Airport in a vehicle of the Army and it was taken to Mumbai in a flight. The Corporal’s body will be taken to his native place in Surat by road from Mumbai.