The Bidhannagar police have not been able to arrest anyone accused of abusing and assaulting five young women and family members of some of them near Duttabad, on EM Bypass, on Diwali night.
A senior officer of the Bidhannagar Police Commissionerate said they had collected footage from CCTV cameras, including the ones fixed at eateries and shops on a 100m stretch of the Science City-bound flank of the Bypass.
“We have started scanning the footage to find out the exact sequence of events on Diwali night,” said the officer.
One of the young women said she was still in trauma and was finding it difficult to believe that something like that could happen on one of the busiest roads in the city.
“I had never imagined my city to be like this. Most of the shops downed their shutters seeing our plight. The cars parked in front of them drove off. I had run out of Duttabad to the Bypass and asked two policemen, who were standing across the road, for help. They refused on the ground that they were from the Kolkata police and we were in an area that was under the jurisdiction of the Bidhannagar police," she said.
The women, who were out on a drive, had parked their car in front of an eatery on the Bypass and gone to relieve themselves inside a dark alley in Duttabad.
They were allegedly abused and assaulted by a number Duttabad residents after a group of men followed them inside the alley.
On Thursday, the stretch of EM Bypass, which has more than a dozen fast food stalls and shops selling cigarettes, had only a few cars around 7pm.
“We are opening our stalls but the footfall has gone down after news of the incident spread. People are scared to come here and it’s bad for us,” said Rabin Ghosh, who runs a shop that sells coffee, cigarettes and soft drinks.
Several residents of Duttabad said most of the assaulters had not returned to the locality since Diwali. The women and their family members were allegedly thrashed with broom sticks, rods and bricks.
“The cops came and asked their whereabouts. Everyone has left,” said a woman.