Party turns deadly in Calcutta: 30-year-old shot in head, four arrested
Telegraph | 28 March 2026
A 30-year-old man was killed with a bullet in the head while partying on a friend’s terrace early on Thursday morning in a residential neighbourhood near Garia.
A bullet grazed the host’s head.
The police said the victims and the attackers were all criminals — facing charges including assault and rioting — and the shooting resulted from a dispute over sharing the proceeds of crime.
Rahul Dey, the murdered man, was locally known as a Trinamool Congress activist. His friend and host, Jeet Mukherjee, is in hospital.
Police sources said a group of men had arrived at Mukherjee’s Purba Phool Bagan home, climbed onto the terrace and started firing. Four men had been arrested by Thursday evening. Neighbours said there were "seven or eight" attackers.
The shooting, in a residential area, has again underlined how easily criminals can procure firearms in Calcutta and how brazenly they use them.
The murder comes barely a month before the city votes in Assembly elections, and at a time when the police and central forces have begun "area-domination exercises".
Sources said Dey, a resident of Chatterjee Colony near Bijoygarh, had come to Mukherjee’s home on Wednesday night.
"Around 1 am on Thursday, Patuli police station received information of a shooting at 53 Purba Phool Bagan," joint commissioner (crime) Rupesh Kumar said.
Joint commissioner Kumar added: “A team rushed to the spot. One Jeet Mukherjee was found to be badly injured and one Rahul Dey was found unconscious, lying in a pool of blood. Later, both were admitted to a private hospital where Dey was declared dead.”
A neighbour said she had heard a “loud noise very late in the night”.
“There were loud screams, too. Later, I learned someone had been killed. It is such a scary situation in this peaceful neighbourhood,” the homemaker said.
Police sources said Mukherjee had from his hospital bed named some of the men who had stormed onto his terrace and “started firing at random”.
They said Mukherjee had identified four men -- Deep Roy, Bidhan Bannerjee, Raja Banik and Jayanta Ghosh -- all of whom were arrested “within a few hours”.
Preliminary investigations suggested that Ghosh had pulled the trigger, thesources added. It wasn’t clear how many shots had been fired, or whether Dey was the intended target. Investigators said several liquor bottles, a spent cartridge, multiple mobile phones belonging to the accused and Ghosh’s wallet had been found on the spot.
Neighbours said a group of “seven or eight” men had climbed onto the terrace of the multi-storey apartment complex where Mukherjee lives.
“I heard multiple bangs, mistaking them for firecrackers. Later, I learned about the firing,” a neighbour said.
Another neighbour said he saw one of Mukherjee’s friends hiding on the ledge and later making a call a few minutes after the assailants had left.
A few cars, including that of Mukherjee, parked on the ground floor of an under-construction building adjacent to his home were damaged, apparently targeted by the attackers before they left.
The police have seized a motorcycle parked outside the building. It was not clear whether any of the assailants had arrived on the bike.
Mukherjee had left the Purba Phool Bagan flat in 2021 and rented an apartment nearby, the police said. He had returned to his old address recently and invited his friends over on Wednesday night.
It appears that several others were present in the house when the shooting happened.
Dey’s family claimed he was not close to Mukherjee but had been invited to the party, which ultimately got him killed.
All four accused have been charged with murder and Arms Act violations. They were produced before the Alipore court on Thursday and remanded in police custody.
Deputy commissioner (south suburban division) Charu Sharma said it appeared that a dispute over the share of the spoils between two groups of “antisocials” had led to the shooting.
“We will find out more, now that they are in our custody,” Sharma said.