CISF jawan shot dead in Bengal's Salanpur, tension grips area

Kolkata, April 24 (IANS) Tension erupted in Salanpur in the West Burdwan district of West Bengal after the body of a Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) jawan was found in suspicious circumstances.

The jawan, identified as Sunil Kumar Paswan, was shot dead on Wednesday night.

A resident of Mihijam in neighbouring Jharkhand, Paswan was posted at Bokaro. He owned land at Salanpur, and recently, some construction work started there.

The body of the jawan was recovered late Wednesday night from the land owned by him. The police recovered several liquor bottles and glasses at the spot where the body was found.

The investigating officials suspect that a group of people, including the deceased individual, were consuming alcohol at the spot. The cops are not ruling out the possibility of a quarrel breaking out in an intoxicated state, following which bullets were fired and Paswan was killed.

Paswan's local friend, Pankaj Sharma, informed the cops and the media persons that the deceased CISF jawan, a head constable by rank, was on leave and he came to Salanpur to review the progress of construction on the land owned by him.

The younger brother of the deceased CISF jawan, Ajit Paswan, said that on being informed that his brother had been shot, he rushed to the spot. “On reaching the spot, I saw my brother’s body lying in a pool of blood. He was on leave and was supposed to join back duty soon,” the brother of the deceased CISF jawan said.

At the time the report was filed, the investigating officials seemed to be clueless about the person or persons responsible for the murder. The body was sent for post-mortem purposes.

“Prima facie, from the number of empty liquor bottles and glasses recovered from the spot of the murder, it appears that a group of persons, including the deceased person, was consuming alcohol there. There is a possibility that a quarrel broke out, which led to the shootout. However, we are carrying out our investigation and trying to locate those behind this murder,” a district police official said.

--IANS

src/dpb