Tags:
Journalism of Courage
A 78-year-old woman was found dead under mysterious circumstances at her home in Sarojini Nagar’s Krishna Lok Colony.
According to the police, Purnima Mitra’s body, which was discovered on Monday morning, bore no injury. But a few things were missing from the house. “When Purnima’s neighbours did not see her up and about, they called her son Pradipta Shankar Mitra, who lives in Vikas Nagar,” said Rajesh Kumar Singh, Circle Officer, Sarojini Nagar.
Later, her son, along with the neighbours, broke open the door and found the body. The only articles missing were an obsolete portable TV and a mobile phone, which makes it little suspicious, said Kumar. “Had it been a case of mere theft, the miscreants would not have left the other valuables behind.”
It is too early to call it a murder, “but we are investigating this angle too,” said Singh. The police are waiting for the postmortem report for now, said Harish Kumar, Assistant Superintendent of Police (East).
Purnima had been living in the house ever since her husband died in 1990. Besides Pradipta, she has another son, Indra Kumar, who is settled in Jhansi. This is the fifth time in two months a senior citizen has been attacked. In four instances, the victim was a woman.
Past cases
* November 20: Zahurul Hasan (70) was assaulted after he tried to stop a gang of robbers in his Shahadatganj home.
* November 4: Usha Rani (65), wife of Omprakash Aggarwal, the owner of Khun Khunji Jewellers, was battered to death by six miscreants in Thakurganj. The robbers succeeded in running with jewellery worth over Rs 20 lakh.
* October: Saliha Kidwai (66) was robbed and killed in Shahadatganj.
* October 11: Chain snatchers targeted Ashmat Laeek (70) in Shahadatganj. She and her friend, another senior citizen, were thrashed when they tried to resist.
