One person was arrested on Thursday (February 27, 2025) in connection with the death of a 27-year-old woman after her car overturned while racing with an SUV on a highway near Panagarh in West Bengal’s Paschim Bardhaman district earlier this week.
On February 26 night, the police arrested Bablu Yadav from Nigha in Asansol two days after the accident took the young woman’s life on Durgapur Expressway.
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Mr. Yadav was the driver of the white SUV which chased the woman and her friends which led the woman’s car to lose control and crashed. There were four other men in the car who were allegedly drinking as police recovered plastic glasses from their car.
Bablu Yadav is reportedly the owner of the vehicle which was used to chase the woman. The police had already seized the vehicle after the accident came to light.
The prime accused is set to be produced in court.
Asansol-Durgapur Commissionerate DC Abhishek Gupta confirmed that Mr. Yadav has been arrested in relation to this case.
The police have refuted all claims of eve-teasing and harassment in this case. “There is no issue of eve-teasing here. This started between the two cars after one overtook the other. We have CCTV footage of it,” Sunil Kumar Choudhury, Commissioner of Durgapur Asansol Police Commissionerate, said. The footage shows the men’s white car in front and the woman’s car chasing them.
The victim, Sutandra Chattopadhyay, who hails from Chandannagar in Hooghly district, was on her way to Gaya along with her friends. The driver of the deceased woman’s vehicle said that their car was first hit outside a petrol pump in Budbud and later chased for 20 km. The vehicle of the deceased woman overturned at Panagarh on the Grand Trunk Road post-midnight on Monday.
Ms. Chattopadhyay who was the sole breadwinner of the family died on the spot.
According to police sources, Bablu has a car parts business. All of the five men who were there in the car that chased the woman’s car are said to be from the Panagarh area. The drivers and other passengers in the woman’s car have lodged a complaint at the local police station.
But all the men in the white car fled on foot right after the accident.
“My husband passed away about eight months ago and my daughter was everything. I want justice and nothing else,” the mother of the deceased woman said. She also raised questions about why the others were not arrested and asked for a detailed investigation into the matter.
The mother also accused that if the police have CCTV footage, then why was there no monitoring of the CCTV. She added, “Why did the police not take immediate action after seeing the CCTV footage when the car chase was happening in real time?”
Communist Party of India (Marxist) West Bengal State secretary Mohammad Salim went to meet the mother on Tuesday and assured legal support. He added, “Whatever the mother said should be considered as a part of the FIR.”
