Kolkata protests as govt transfers top cop who solved Park Street rape case

Damayanti Sen, Kolkata's first woman joint commissioner of police (Crime) who endeared herself to the masses by her single-minded pursuit and subsequent cracking of the sensational Park Street rape case, was Wednesday shunted out to an insignificant post, triggering angry reactions across the city.

Sen has now been made Deputy Inspector General of Police (Training), Barrackpore, considered a garage posting for an Indian Police Service officer till now entrusted with solving the complex crime cases in the metropolis. She has been replaced by Joint Commissioner (Organisation) Pallab Kanti Ghosh.

Damayanti probed the case though efforts were made to cover it up (TV Grab Courtesy: Star TV)

In stark contrast to West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, who dismissed the allegations of an Anglo-Indian woman that she was raped in a moving car Feb 6 as "cooked up" and "an attempt to malign the government", Sen had said: "Something must have occurred."

She, along with her team of dedicated officers continued the investigation with gusto, and then arrested three people to confirm that the mother of two had indeed been raped.

Sen's success in solving the case had also run counter to city Police Commissioner Ranjit Pachnanda's comment that the allegation was a campaign to "malign the police and the government."

Two days after she cracked the case, Sen and Joint Commissioner of Police (Headquarters) Jawed Shamim had to rush to the state secretariat, Writers' building to "clarify" their stand to the chief minister.

"Several newspapers have been reporting that I have been working on the case as an individual going against my organisation. This is absolutely false. I have been successful only because of my team. This is not my individual success," Sen told the media after the meeting.

With the media going ga-ga about her, a visibly uncomfortable Sen -a 1996 batch IPS officer - said: "The investigation is still on and we are yet to arrest more accused persons. But more than the probe, my personal life has become important for the media which I feel very disturbed about. I wanted to clarify this."

Some newspapers and television channels had claimed that Sen had worked almost without a break for three days, with some assistance from Shamim, to solve the case, despite her boss the police commissioner and the chief minister raising doubts publicly about the victim's allegation.

The 37-year-old victim, grateful to Sen for standing by her, had called the police officer a "tigress".

The woman had complained that she was raped at gunpoint Feb 6 inside a moving car after late night partying in a night club on fashionable Park Street.

Aghast over Sen's removal, writer Suchitra Bhattacharya said: "This will not send the right signal to people. This will only lower the morale of the police force."

"I don't know what is happening. People will not like this. The circumstances of her removal raises many questions. Upright police officers should not be treated in this way," said writer Tilottama Majumdar. - IANS