College Security Guard Arrested in Kolkata Law Student Gang Rape Case
The 24-year-old woman had gone to the college to fill out a form for a test and was forced to stay back in the union room even after it was completed
Kolkata: Widening the net of its probe into the student's gangrape at South Calcutta Law College, the Kolkata police arrested the security guard of the academic institution and recovered a video clip of the horrific crime from the cellphone of one of the accused.
It has also set up a special investigation team for an extensive probe. The security guard, Pinaki Banerjee (55), who belongs to a private agency, was taken into custody on Friday night after some discrepancies were found in his statement during his questioning following his detention.
He was posted at the college for the past two years. On Saturday, Pinaki Banerjee was remanded in police custody till July 1 by the Alipore court following his production.
According to the victim's complaint, Pinaki Banerjee locked the main gate of the college on the orders of TMC leader Monojit Mishra and his aides, Pramit Mukherjee and Zaib Ahmed, who later forcibly took her to the security guard's room and gangraped her there in the evening of June 25.
The 24-year-old survivor stated in her complaint that Pinaki Banerjee was sitting ‘helpless’ outside his room because it was locked by the accused before committing the crime. The cops feel that the guard could have informed them or the college authorities by calling them from his cell phone about the incident but he did not.
They are now grilling the four face to face. They also recovered a video recording of the gangrape from the seized cell phone of one of the four arrested and sent it for forensic examination. The clip is of around one minute and a half, sources revealed.
Whose cell phone was used in recording the video is yet to be known so far. Earlier, the victim alleged in her complaint that the accused had video recorded their crime on her and tried to ‘blackmail’ her with a threat to circulate it on social media.
The investigators also recovered a seven-hour-long CCTV footage dated June 25 from the college and sent it for forensic test. The development coincided with the college authorities’ step to increase CCTV installation which became visible on the premises.
The police have also stumbled upon close ties between Monojit, Pramit and Zaib existing before the crime they committed. Scanning the Facebook account of Monojit, the main accused, the cops found that Pramit and Zaib have already been mentioned as his ‘Brother’ in his profile.