A woman and her friend were allegedly assaulted by a group of youths in Howrah’s Shibpur when they tried to move past a Kali Puja immersion procession on a two-wheeler on Thursday night.
The woman told the police that she was on her way to buy medicines with a friend, who was driving the two-wheeler, around 10.30pm on Thursday.
At Malibagan, close to where she lives near Nabanna, a group of youths stopped them saying they would have to wait till the procession passed.
The woman, a second-year student of commerce at a college in Howrah, tried to reason with the youths saying she was in a hurry to pick up medicines. When the woman and her friend tried to move past the procession on the two-wheeler, some youths allegedly attacked them.
“They showered blows on my sister and her friend and refused to listen to them. My sister fell and suffered injuries on her head and eyes. So did her friend. My sister’s left eye was swollen from the attack,” the woman’s sister told The Telegraph.
“A few bystanders approached some civic volunteers for help when the two were being attacked. But the volunteers refused to move saying they were scared of youths from Malibagan.”
The woman told the police that the assaulters were drunk and they also attacked a few bystanders, who tried to rescue them, with lit cigarettes.
She also alleged that the attackers snatched her mobile phone.
“The woman has said she can identify at least two of the attackers. We are trying to find out the whereabouts of some of the accused,” said an officer of the Howrah police commissionerate.
After recovering from the attack, the woman and her friend returned home and narrated the incident to her family members.
The family then reached Shibpur police station and the woman’s friend lodged a complaint.
The police have started a case of outraging a woman’s modesty, wrongful restraint and criminal intimidation with common intent.
No one was arrested till late Friday evening.
