Kolkata: On August 20, at around 1.00 p.m., word came into Parnasree Police Station that a disturbance was building up in the Bankim Pally area. Officers immediately rushed to the spot to find a small crowd gathered in front of a house, with some of them alleging that a couple named Bappa Jana and his wife Punam had come to the house to sell their two children, a daughter aged two and a three-month-old son.
When the police questioned Jana, he told police that he has been physically disabled since birth, and earned a living as a rickshaw puller. With his earnings severely affected by the lockdown, he had been unable to pay house rent for quite a few months, and the landlord had finally evicted the family from their Santoshpur home. With nowhere else to go, Jana and his family had been living on pavement for five days, until he ran into an old friend of his called Debu Mondal yesterday. On hearing of their plight, Mondal had invited the family to stay at his home in Bankim Pally until alternative accommodation could be found. And that was how a rumor had spread about the couple trying to sell their children.
The police inquiries turned up nothing to support or substantiate this allegation. During the inquiry, Jana told that he has already arranged for rented accommodation in the Pailan area, a fact that the police verified. Child Welfare Committee chairperson Mrs. Mahua Karmakar has also spoken to the couple. Subsequently, the family has been allowed to go to their new home. Further, a job has been found for Jana in a pen manufacturing unit in Pailan, and Parnasree Police Station has kept in constant touch with the family. The Police personal of Parnasree Police Station who took part were Sub Inspector Sumit Bhattacharya, Lady Sub Inspector Munmun Mukherjee, Constable Dipankar Debnath, OC Parnasree PS, Inspector Soumya Thakur, and Sub Inspector Rajib Das.
Our, Reporter in Chief
R. Manoj Kumar Sharma
Siliguri City, West Bengal
