Example of India Shining…
KOLKATA: You can’t shake off that eerie feeling while driving down the killer speedway, VIP Road. I was on my way back after the Sunday night shift, my nerves taut on the deadly stretch, when I spotted an overturned Tata somewhere between Golaghata and Sreebhumi.
We stopped and got out. There was glass strewn all over. I saw four-five policemen ambling about and asked one of them what had happened.
" *Oi, ekta accident hoyechhe. Accident to hotei thake ekhane. Sumo ulte giyechhe, dekhchhi ki kora jai *(An accident, as usual. A Sumo has toppled. Let’s see what we can do)," he said, without any sense of urgency. I was stunned.
But a more grisly shock awaited me.
I looked around, and saw a little boy sitting on the median divider. He was trembling, hugging his knees and staring at the Sumo with a terrified, yet pleading eyes. He tried to say something, but nothing came out of his mouth. A bloodied victim lay a few feet from him, groaning in pain. None of the policemen had bothered to console the child or even hold his hand. It has been 30 excruciating minutes since the accident. “Are you okay,” I put my arms around him and asked. He did not but managed to mumble, " *Amar baba ke bachan *(save my father)," and pointed to the mangled vehicle.
I was horrified to see a man’s head sticking out from under the Sumo. This was eight-year-old Abhi’s father Sudipto Mukherjee. The policemen were doing nothing to rescue him. The Lake Town traffic guard is just 400 metres from the accident site. A crane could easily have been summoned.
I couldn’t believe this was happening, that policemen could just stand and watch a man die - and make his child a part of the horror, too.
All that the men from Lake Town police station had done till then was drag four of the other injured to the roadside. Two patrol jeeps stood idling nearby.
“Why aren’t you people taking the injured to hospital?” I shouted at one of them. “We are waiting for the ambulance. Aapni ke?” he shot back.
I revealed my identity and said my office could be used to ferry the injured. Some passersby helped put three of the injured into our Ambassador and we took them to Manicktala ESI hospital.
The men in uniform suddenly put up a professional act and “offered” one of their vehicles as well. But they still stood and watched Sudipto Mukherjee being crushed under the car.
Around 3 am, a group of young employees from the nearby star hotel stopped by. As the policemen watched, the youths pitted their muscle against the upturned vehicle, lifted it and dragged Sudipto out.
“Amar baba theek acche to?” little Abhi asked again. I did not know what to say. I only held him tightly. Police bundled Sudipto’s stiff body into the back of a jeep and took it to hospital. He was dead.
The crane arrived a little later. The ambulance never did.
“Sudipto was the only earning member of his family. His wife, mother and son are in deep trauma,” said Sudipto’s cousin Pappu. The group was returning to New Barrackpore after attending a wedding reception in Joynagar.
When Bidhannagar additional SP Asok Biswas was asked about the incident, his only explanation was that they had to “requisition ambulances”. On police inaction though, he refused to comment.