Retired Calcutta high court judge Anindita Roy Saraswati will head a six-member special investigation team (SIT) probing the deaths of 19 people in a stampede at Kolkata’s Durga Puja pandal on October 17, the West Bengal government announced on Wednesday. HT saw a copy of the government order.
Saraswati is also hearing petitions from voters delisted during the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of the electoral roll in West Bengal. The other members of the SIT are the principal secretary of the disaster management and civil defence department, the director general of police of the special task force (STF), a representative of the state director general of police not below the rank of additional DGP, a home department representative not below the rank of joint secretary and a representative of the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF).
“The SIT shall submit its report and recommendations to the government in three months from today,” a senior state official said, requesting anonymity.
The Suvendu Adhikari-led Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government drew flak from the opposition five months after coming to power in West Bengal because of the stampede at the Chorebagan Sarbojanin Durgotsav Samity pandal on Saturday, which killed 19 people, including five children, and injured 25 others.
The Mamata All India Trinamool Congress (MAITC) and the Left parties targeted chief minister Adhikari, after his nephew, Depdeep Adhikari, was involved in the puja as its patron, along with BJP’s north Calcutta unit president Tamoghna Ghosh and the party’s Jorasanko MLA Vijay Ojha.
The chief minister announced after the tragedy that his government would appeal to the Calcutta high court to allow the formation of a probe committee headed by a sitting high court judge. He also said no officer of the Kolkata police, the city fire brigade and the municipal corporation would be included in the probe team since they were supposed to ensure the safety of people at the pandal.
The state’s appeal was heard by the Calcutta High Court on Tuesday during the hearing of a public interest litigation demanding an impartial inquiry. A division bench led by Chief Justice Ravindra V Ghuge directed the government to set up a commission of inquiry headed by a retired judge of the court. Justice Ghuge said that, according to Supreme Court directives, a sitting judge cannot preside over such an inquiry.
The chief minister visited the grieving families on Tuesday and Wednesday and distributed monetary compensation announced by the state and the Centre. The state has also promised a job for one member of each family.
“I visited the pandal and inquired about what happened that evening. Nobody would have died had someone not announced over the loudspeaker that the pandal was about to collapse. The incident happened because of human error and not because a crowd entered the pandal to take shelter from rain,” Adhikari said.
Anindita Roy Saraswati is among the 19 retired high court judges appointed by the Election Commission of India in March this year to head appellate tribunals in West Bengal following directives from the Supreme Court.