The post-mortem of Ashok Kumar Singh, who died minutes after he entered Amherst Street police station reportedly to return an allegedly stolen mobile phone on Wednesday, was carried out on Thursday under videography.
A public interest litigation (PIL) was filed at Calcutta High Court against the state government alleging custody death.
Ashok Kumar Singh, who was mistakenly mentioned as Ashok Shaw in the report published in The Telegraph on Thursday, is survived by his wife and three children. They arrived in the city from Bihar on Thursday.
An officer of Kolkata police said the preliminary opinion of the doctors who conducted the post-mortem was that “Singh was suffering from pre-existing disease.”
“According to the opinion of the doctor, he may have been suffering from a brain aneurysm (balloon like growth) that had formed and suddenly ruptured…,” said the officer.
Sarad Jaiswal, one of Singh's relatives who lodged a complaint with Amherst Street police station seeking a probe into the death, said: “We still do not know what caused it."
Jaiswal said the family did not claim the body on Thursday because they were waiting for a court order.
High court lawyer and BJP leader Priyanka Tibrewal had moved the court with the allegation of custody death. The matter was heard on Thursday and is likely to be heard again on Friday.
According to the police, Singh was called to the police station to deposit a stolen mobile phone that was allegedly traced to him. “I have heard that he (Singh) got this phone from a customer who came to his shop. Without realising that it was stolen, he started using it. The police tracked down the phone to him,” Jaiswal said.
Madan Lal Gupta, a BJP leader in north Kolkata, said he received a call from Singh informing him that the police had called him up for depositing the phone.
“I told him to go to the police station. He also called me from the police station. But not once did he mention anything about being tortured,” Gupta told The Telegraph on Thursday.
An officer at Lalbazar said that according to their findings and CCTV footage analysis, Singh was seen entering the police station and stepping out before re-entering.
“He made a call to a BJP leader (Gupta), who then alerted a sergeant at the police station. The sergeant went to the investigating officer’s room where Singh was. A minute later, the sergeant stepped out and met Jaiswal and his wife, who were told that Singh was ill,” said the officer.
The police said that despite being summoned to be present during the post-mortem, none of the family members was there. Jaiswal said they could not attend the “PM” as they were in the court.