Kol court acquits murder accused after 8 yrs in jail
Times of India | 29 April 2025
Kolkata: A 31-year-old man, who spent the last eight years in jail for alleged murder, has been acquitted by a Kolkata court, which faulted police for not sending the alleged murder weapons — a bloodstained pillow and a cotton belt — for forensic examination.
Raja Paik had been arrested in Sept 2017 for the murder of his friend, Chiranjib Gupta (24). Chiranjib's mother had lodged a complaint with the Garfa police after she found him lying dead with a pillow on his face on the first floor of their home in Garfa.
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On Thursday, Alipore sessions court judge Surajit Mandal, setting Raja Paik free, said prosecution had failed to explain why the bloodstained pillow was not sent for forensic examination by the investigating agency. "That aspect," he said, "creates a doubt with respect to the manner in which the investigation has been handled." The judge also expressed surprise that a cotton belt, claimed to be the "murder weapon", was similarly not sent for any forensic examination.
The prosecution had also argued that Paik's possession of Chiranjib's cellphone linked him to the killing. The court refused to buy this logic, questioning why a murderer would hold on to such evidence, knowing full well that it would incriminate him.
Judge Surajit Mandal expressed disbelief that Paik had held on to Chiranjib's cellphone — "vital evidence", according to prosecution — in spite of knowing that it would implicate him.
"Any person who commits murder would try to erase physical evidence that may implicate him," the judge reasoned. "One who commits murder is not expected under natural circumstances to create evidence against himself. If a person, after committing murder in cold blood, commits theft of an article such as the mobile phone belonging to the victim, he must have the impression that theft of this kind of article, such as a mobile phone, would be a good piece of evidence to help the investigating agency to reach out to him."
Chiranjib's mother, in her police complaint, had mentioned that Chiranjib was a drug addict and a habitual drunkard. She said she had gone to buy medicines for her daughter and returned at 6.30pm to find her son dead. The daughter had returned home from school at 3pm, when Chiranjib opened the door for her. Though not sure, she named Poncha, Lonka, Bapi, Jhontu and Amit, who frequented her home, as possible suspects.
Curiously, the police never questioned the suspects named in the FIR. The judge commented on this. The complainant, he said, had named in the FIR "many boys who used to come to her house and consume drugs with her son. It is best known to the investigating officer why he did not consider it necessary to focus the investigation on the other associates of the victim, who used to visit him regularly."
"Only because the accused was a frequent visitor to the victim and was his partner in all sorts of activities not considered ‘normal' in society, he cannot be framed as the murderer," the judge said, acquitting Paik.