Zubeen's Death: Many Summoned By SIT Fail To Attend Meeting

Guwahati: In what came as serious embarrassment for the Assam police, most of the prominent citizens on Tuesday declined to attend a meeting called by the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) to apprise and update them on its investigation into the death of singer Zubeen Garg in Singapore.

Though, Assam police had not released the list of prominent citizens, mostly journalists invited for the meeting on Tuesday, several of those invitees took to social media to reveal that they have received telephone call from the SIT chief to be present at the meeting.

Many of the journalists who refused to attend the meeting came out openly on social media and said that they have advised the SIT chief that such meeting was uncalled for by the investigating agency.

Author-editor Anuradha Sharma Pujaree, in a post on social media, said when she received the phone call to participate in the meeting, she had declined the invitation. “I also think that instead of inviting me, if people with legal and medical science knowledge were invited, they could have been better placed to give suggestions that would help the SIT investigation,” she said.

Another eminent author, Phanindra Devchoudhury, also said that he has turned down the invite received over the phone. “The issue which I had ended from my end in a phone call of a few seconds is active on social media. It is good to keep the discussion going on. People are revealed all of a sudden,” he wrote on the social media.

Leaders of All Assam Students’ Union (Aasu), turning down the invite, said in a statement that it has decided against attending the meeting so that the accused cannot question the neutrality of SIT for discussing progress of the case with an organisation which is persistently seeking a thorough probe into Garg's death.

The 52-year-old singer-composer died while swimming in the sea in Singapore on September 19. He was there to attend the 4th North East India Festival. The CID Special DG Mr Munna Prasad Gupta, who is heading the 10-member Special Investigating Team (SIT) probing the death, on Monday said that a few eminent members of civil society have been invited to give them an update on the case and progress on investigations on Tuesday afternoon.

It is significant that seven persons -- North East India Festival chief organiser Shyamkanu Mahanta, the singer's manager Siddharth Sharma, his two band members Shekhar Jyoti Goswami and Amrit Prabha Mahanta, his cousin and Assam Police DSP Sandipan Garg, and his PSOs Nandeswar Bora and Prabin Baishya – have been arrested in the case so far.

Meanwhile, the official post-mortem report of Gauhati Medical College and Hospital (GMCH) has confirmed that Zubeen Garg’s death was “not caused by poisoning.”

The report, according to sources, stated that no traces of poison or toxic substances were found in his viscera or other body fluids, ruling out any toxicological interference.

The cause of death, according to sources, has been attributed to drowning.

The finding directly contradicts claims made by Zubeen’s band member, Shekhar Jyoti Goswami, who was arrested in connection with the case.

Goswami, in his “grounds of arrest” notice, had alleged that Zubeen may have been poisoned by prime accused Shyamkanu Mahanta and Zubeen’s manager, Siddharth Sharma—a theory that added a new dimension to the investigation by the Special Investigation Team (SIT).