SI killing: 21 people held in Cooch Behar

Twenty-one people were arrested in connection with the killing of a sub-inspector of police in Cooch Behar district on Tuesday night, the district police said on Wednesday.

SI Ranjit Pal and another personnel of Kotwali police station were injured in stone-pelting when they raided a gambling den at Panisala village in Cooch Behar-I block.

Both were admitted to MJN Hospital in Cooch Behar where the SI was declared “brought dead” on arrival.

MLA and Trinamul Congress Cooch Behar district president Rabindranath Ghosh, who visited the area today, told the media that the SI had been suffering from high blood pressure and heart ailments and that he died of those complications only after he was taken to the hospital.

Cooch Behar SP Rajesh Kumar Yadav too said that the SI had died of sudden cardiac arrest, though he admitted that Pal had sustained injury in stone-pelting by the gamblers.

The DIG of Police (Jalpaiguri Range), C S Lepcha, arrived in Cooch Behar today to take stock of the situation.

The SI's body was taken to his residence at Alipurduar.

District Congress president Shyamal Chaudhury and District BJP general secretary Nikhil Ranjan Dey, however, questioned the statements by the SP and the TMC leader, saying the police official had been killed by gamblers during official duty.