Accused in Anandapur molestation case arrested, sent to custody

A man allegedly involved in molesting and throwing out a woman from his car besides knocking down another woman has been arrested from Dumdum area near Kolkata, police said.

The accused Abhishek Pandey was remanded to seven-day police custody by a Kolkata court on Wednesday.

A senior police officer said, Pandey who had allegedly molested the 31-year old woman in his car on Saturday night was arrested from a guest house in Dumdum area, in the northern outskirts of Kolkata, on Tuesday night.

He was booked under several sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), Joint Commissioner of Police (Crime) Murlidhar Sharma said.

Pandey had checked in at a guest house in Anandapur area of east Kolkata till Sunday morning after allegedly committing the crime and then went to meet a friend in Sealdah.

He then checked in at the Dumdum guest house where the police zeroed in on him.

He was tracked through GPRS on his mobile and the police confirmed his role in the incident after checking the registration number of his car, job profile, social media activities and other details, the officer said.

Initially the victim had wrongly mentioned the name of Pandey as Amitabha Bose in her complaint which caused delay in tracking him, the officer said.

The woman was Pandey's friend and had dinner with him at a restaurant before she was allegedly molested, the officer said.

Pandey, in his early 30s, had also knocked down Nilanjana Chatterjee when she was trying to stop his vehicle from speeding away and save the molestation victim who was pushed off the car in Anandapur area.

The braveheart was returning home with her husband in their car when they heard the victim, sitting beside Pandey in another vehicle behind them, crying for help.

Chatterjee's husband had stopped their vehicle to block the path of the other car.

His wife was seriously injured when Pandey hit her with his car in his bid to flee. She underwent surgery in a private hospital on Monday.

Commissioner of Kolkata Police, Anuj Sharma, on Tuesday commended Chatterjee who risked her life to save the lady and informed her that the government has decided to bear the cost of her treatment.