'Played dead': How 14-year-old Tangra boy fooled uncle ‘who tried to smother him’ with pillow
Telegraph | 28 February 2025
Pranay Dey’s 14-year-old son has claimed his uncle Prasun tried to smother him with a pillow at their Tangra home on February 18 but he survived by holding his breath and playing dead, a child rights body has said.
Officials of the West Bengal Commission for Protection of Child Rights met the boy, involved in a car crash with his father and uncle in the early hours of February 19, at NRS Medical College and Hospital on Thursday.
“He said he was a regular at the gym and practised yoga. So he could hold his breath for a long time and play dead to escape a fatal attack. He said his uncle had tried to smother him with a pillow,” commission adviser Ananya Chakraborti said.
The police said they were investigating the claim about Prasun’s attempt to smother the boy.
Chakraborti said the commission team did not want to ask the traumatised boy too many questions but he kept narrating what he had gone through virtually on his own.
“Given the choice, he wants to go to his grandparents (the parents of the boy’s aunt, who was found dead with his mother and his cousin at their home). The elderly couple’s son does want the boy’s custody,” Chakraborti said.
According to the car crash survivors, the accident on EM Bypass was a collective suicide attempt, police say. The statement of one of the Dey brothers led to the discovery of the three women’s bodies at their Tangra home – who police believe were murdered after a family “suicide pact” came to naught, with a sedative-laced payesh failing to do the job.
A gist of what the teen told the commission members:
Neem-payesh
According to Chakraborti, the boy said the family of six had been having payesh mixed with neem leaves for the preceding few days. (This was apparently the Deys’ way of preparing the children for the bitter taste of the sedative-laced payesh to be served to them on February 17 night.)
“He said that that day (February 17 night) the payesh was more bitter (than usual),” Chakraborti said.
'Held my breath'
The Class VIII student said his uncle tried to smother him with a pillow (on February 18, after the payesh failed to kill him), the commission officials said. “He said he held his breath until his uncle thought he was dead and went away,” Chakraborti said.
‘Suicide bid’
After his uncle left, the boy went to some other rooms and found that his mother, aunt and cousin (Prasun’s 14-year-old daughter) were all dead, Chakraborti said, quoting the boy.
“He said his father and uncle went to the terrace to end their lives. The boy said he went to the second-floor room where he, his father and his uncle entered into a (second) suicide pact and consumed sleeping pills,” Chakraborti said.
Chakraborti said: “He said he took a few pills but it did not have much effect on him. He did not speak about his car journey (till the crash) thereafter, and we did not ask him.”
Debt crisis
According to Chakraborti, the boy said that two days before the suicide attempt, his father had mentioned that the family was deep in debt.
“He said his father spoke of the fear that the creditors might attack the house and said there was no option other than ending their lives. He (the boy) said his father and uncle had a discussion on the subject that day, but he was not allowed there,” Chakraborti said.
What next
The boy, now confined to a hospital bed, is trying to find comfort in a book on Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose that someone has gifted him. The police guards could notsay who had gifted him the book.
The commission gave the boy a chessboard and chess pieces after he said he loved the game and longed to play it.
The boy, Prasun and Pranay are in the same ward. The police said the boy and his uncle Prasun were “completely fit”. His father, Pranay, still needs traction for a fracture.
“We want him to come back to normal life. We are not keen to have him shifted to a government home,” Chakraborti said.
The commission is trying to see if the boy can be put up at a relative’s home.
The Dey home in Tangra has been sealed as part of the murder investigation. The teen girl showed signs of poisoning while the two older women bled to death from cuts that were not self-inflicted, the police have said citing post-mortem findings.
The police said Prasun has claimed the women slashed their wrists themselves. Pranay too has denied slashing the women’s wrists but admitted that the plan to mix sedatives into the payesh was his, officers said.
“But when this plan failed, he said he did not make any other plan (to murder anyone),” an officer said.