West Bengal: Wanted criminal shot dead in war-zone encounter

JAGADDAL: Notorious history-sheeter Prabhu Shaw, who was wanted for his role in the recent spate of political violence in the Jagaddal-Kanchrapara belt, was shot dead in a rare police encounter in Bengal on Tuesday.

Kankinara residents shrieked in fear and scurried for cover after a cop chase led to a fierce gunbattle, first on a busy road, then from inside a house, and finally ending in the drawing room of another resident.His body riddled with bullets, Shaw came crashing down from an asbestos-sheet roof inside medicine-supplier Sanjeeb Banerjee’s home at Sukhiapara Gali.
Shaw died before he could be taken to a hospital.
Witnesses said the faceoff started around 2.20pm when Shaw and his two accomplices were chased by police along Gali No. 12. Shaw made a dash towards Shundhiya Estate as his men opened fire and hurled bombs at the cops. Gunshots rocked the neighbourhood as police retaliated. Locals said they heard at least 15 to 20 rounds of gunshots during the 16 minutes that turned the area into a war-zone.
“When the trio took Sukhiapara Gali (leading to Shundhiya Estate), Shaw’s two associates managed to shrug off their police pursuers. But Shaw found himself hemmed in by police, who had split into three teams and blocked all exit routes. Shaw then barged into the house of one Mou Patra,” said Balaram Thakur, a resident.
Patra (36) was visibly shaken while recalling the horror. “It was around 2.30pm and I was feeding my child. Suddenly, a gun-wielding man stormed into my house and went upstairs to the terrace, firing towards the road. We also heard a lot of gunshots around our house.”
She said: “ I cried out in horror and told my family members to lock the doors and windows immediately. Then I realized that the armed youth had jumped on the roof on my next-door neighbour Sanjib Banerjee’s house.”
On hearing the gunshots, the Banerjee family had already shut the windows and doors. They could hear heavy footsteps on their asbestos roof.
“During the indiscriminate firing, we had locked ourselves inside. Suddenly, I heard footsteps on the roof as a man moved fast. I was shocked when the man came crashing through the roof and landed on the floor of my drawing room, bleeding profusely. He was riddled with bullets,” Banerjee said.
“A police team from Jagaddal police station was patrolling in the Kankinara railway siding area on Friday afternoon following a fresh bombing. When police saw Shaw and his two aides, they asked them to surrender. Instead, they opened fire and hurled bombs at cops. The policemen had to return fire in self-defence. Shaw was rushed to nearby hospital where he was declared dead on arrival. We have recovered a revolver with two live cartridges from Shaw,” said Manoj Kumar Verma, the police commissioner of Barrackpore.
Verma added that police were checking the specific records of Prabhu Shaw’s criminal past. Shaw, a resident of Kankinara’s Shukarmari, was wanted in connection with several cases in the Kankinara-Jagaddal area in the recent past, police sources said.