Police in North Dinajpur announced a cash reward of ₹2 lakh to gather information about Sajjak Alam, the undertrial who fired at and critically injured two policemen in Panjipara of the district on Wednesday late afternoon and fled.
The police have also announced a similar award of ₹2 lakh for Abdul Hossain, his friend, who is suspected to have supplied a firearm to Alam while the latter was in court lockup in Islampur.
Absconding undertrial Sajjak Alam; (right) Abdul Hossain Picture courtesy: West Bengal police
“He supplied the firearm to Sajjak Alam at the court lockup. We have received certain leads and working on those to nab the duo,” Rajesh Kumar Yadav, the IGP (NB) told newspersons in Siliguri on Thursday.
The senior police officer said that bullets that had hit the two policemen — Deben Baishya, an assistant sub-inspector, and Nilkanta Sarkar, a constable — were of
7.65mm bore.
“It is non-restricted ammunition and the police don’t use it,” said Yadav, to prove that Alam had fired not fired from the cops’ gun.
After Wednesday’s incident, there were questions on whether Alam managed to get a firearm from someone else or snatched the gun from policemen.
On Wednesday, a police team brought Alam to Islampur from the Raiganj correctional home to present him in court in connection with a case. While they were returning to Raiganj, Alam said he needed to relieve himself. The driver stopped the vehicle on NH27 near Ikarchala Kalibari, which is barely a kilometre away from the Panjipara police outpost and 50 metres from Bihar border.
Along with Alam and the two policemen, there was a woman undertrial and two woman constables in the vehicle.
Alam got out and fired at Baishya and Sarkar. Both suffered bullet injuries and collapsed on the spot.
Later, during their probe, the police collected CCTV footage where it was found that Alam was running along the highway.
The police of Islampur and Raiganj police districts are conducting raids to nab him and Abdul and have intensified vigil along the Bengal-Bihar border to prevent them from fleeing to Bihar.
On Thursday, Bengal DGP Rajeev Kumar reached Siliguri. He went to the private nursing home in Matigara where the two policemen were under treatment. Later, he also went to the spot where the firing took place.
“Our force provides security to people. But if any criminal fires on us, our response would be four-fold. We are trained to strongly deal with such situations,” said Kumar.
Police officers probing the case are focusing on the lapses that occurred while bringing the undertrial — Alam was involved in a murder case — back to Raiganj by road.
“We are checking the security arrangements in the court lockup in Islampur where the undertrial was handed over the firearm. He should have been frisked when he was being in the prison vehicle from the lockup to take him back to the Raiganj correctional home,” said a police officer.
They are also trying to know what prompted the vehicle’s driver and the policemen to stop the vehicle on the highway.
“It was almost dark by then. The Panjipara police outpost is just a kilometre away. Along the four-lane highway, it would take only five minutes to reach there. Even if the undertrial gave the excuse of answering nature’s call, he could have been asked to use the outpost’s washroom. Then, the van would not have stopped on the highway,” the officer added.
Local residents halted an empty ambulance and sent the injured policemen to the Islampur sub-divisional hospital.
“I was standing on the other side of the highway. Suddenly, I heard gunshots. Then we found two policemen lying on the road. They told us that an undertrial had got down from the vehicle to relieve himself and suddenly fired at them. We stopped an ambulance that took them to Islampur,” said Md Tanveer Alam, a resident.