Tangra murder case: Prasun Dey in court, refuses to engage defence lawyer to present case
Telegraph | 5 March 2025
One of the three members of the family from Tangra who was arrested on Monday has told police he killed his only daughter before killing his wife and attempting suicide.
Prasun Dey, 43, who was produced before a court on Tuesday, refused to engage a defence lawyer to present his case. He has been charged with the murder of his wife, sister-in-law and teenage daughter.
Prasun who was arrested on Monday night, hours after he was released from NRS hospital, had spent the night at Tangra police station.
Prasun has told the police that he and his wife Romi killed their daughter Priyambada on February 18 when the poisoned payesh they had consumed the night before failed to work and all the family members woke up the next morning one by one.
“According to his statement, his wife held the girl’s leg while he smothered her with a pillow,” an officer of Kolkata Police's detective department said.
Police sources said Prasun has also told cops that on February 18, Romi had tried to slash her wrists but when she failed, her husband Prasun slashed her wrists and throat to ensure her death. He did the same to his sister-in-law, Prasun has told the police. After that, Prasun slashed his own wrists and lost consciousness. He woke up again later in the evening, he has told the cops.
“The morning after they consumed the poisoned payesh, as the family members started waking up, they decided they would help each other die,” an officer said quoting Prasun.
Prasun has refused legal help. He told a lawyer of the state legal aids forum, who had approached him to sign on the vakalatnama, that he was “aware of what he did” and wanted to admit his fault and so there was no need for a defence lawyer.
Kabita Sarkar, an advocate of the state legal aids forum, told the additional judicial magistrate's court, Sealdah, that she had approached Prasun to sign on the vakalatnama that would empower her to fight his case and submit his bail prayer but he refused.
“I told him that he was eligible to get the service of the state lawyers free of cost. But he refused to sign on the document (vakalatnama) and said he did not want to engage any lawyer,” said Sarkar.
The family had taken a car loan of ₹47 lakh and had other loans to the tune of ₹16 crore, the police are said to have found.
Prasun, his elder brother Pranay, 44, and Pranay’s 14-year-old son had survived a car crash on EM Bypass on February 19. Later, his statement had led to the recovery of the bodies of his wife Romi, his 14-year-old daughter Priyambada and sister-in-law Sudeshna at their four-storey residence in Tangra.
The three surviving members had been admitted to a private hospital and later shifted to a government hospital from where Prasun was released on Monday. His brother and nephew are still at the hospital.
According to legal protocol, Prasun was produced before the court of the Sealdah additional chief judicial magistrate on Tuesday. Prasun was brought to the courtroom and made to stand at the dock as the magistrate asked him to be presented before him in court.
Lawyers present in the court during the hearing later told The Telegraph that the magistrate asked Prasun if he did not want a defence lawyer. Prasun, who had his face covered with a surgical mask, shook his head indicating “no”.
The magistrate told him he would get a lawyer free of cost and asked if he still did not want one. Prasun again responded in the negative, the lawyer said.
The prosecution lawyers said the police needed his custody for the reconstruction of the crime.
The magistrate asked Prasun if he understood the meaning of “police custody”.
“The magistrate explained to him that police custody means the police wanted to keep him in their remand and that he was not going to jail,” said a lawyer who was present in the court.
Prasun was sent to police remand for two days. He would be present before the court again on March 6.