Kolkata: Alzheimer’s patient back home after two nights in carshed, ATM

KOLKATA: The 70-hour ordeal of a 79-year-old Alzheimer’s patient, who went missing from his Patuli home on Saturday, came to an end when a special team from Patuli police station managed to trace him with help from GRP and Budge Budge police. Even several strangers — from bus conductors and porters to railway guards — went beyond their call of duty to help him return home.
Deb Narayan Banerjee, a resident of Baisnabghata Patuli Township in Panchasayar, had left home around 10.30am-11am on Saturday, without money or even a mobile phone.His relatives — including son-in-law Sudip Roy, a distinguished professor at the civil engineering department of IIEST, Shibpur — had lodged a missing complaint with police in the evening.

“We formed several teams with sub-inspector Mihir Biswas leading them. Initially, all routine checks were carried out, including scanning CCTV footage in and around Patuli. We also checked all hospitals and informed all neighbouring police stations. Till 10pm, we had no lead,” said an officer.
The teams were planning to carry out checks at railway stations when they were told by family members that Banerjee — a retired postmaster — wished to visit his brother at Suri in Birbhum. He was also worried about his granddaughter, who was suffering from malaria, and had become desperate to meet her. We sent teams to Howrah and Sealdah with his photographs,” added the officer.
The team talked to “platform resources” at Sealdah — porters, shopkeepers and sweepers. “It was old-age policing as we went from one platform to another. It was then that we met a porter who said he had seen Banerjee sitting on the platform and then getting on to a local train that was headed for the carshed,” the officer said.
After a CCTV check of Platform 10, arranged by GRP, he was finally spotted. “The porter said that two gentlemen were feeding him, but they left when he boarded the train late at night. They were discussing how a bus conductor had helped him reach here. The porter told us that the elderly citizen travelled to the siding on the local train and returned to the station in the same train the next morning,” he added. The cops accordingly went to the carshed but none in the washing line could identify Banerjee.
With the lead getting wasted, the cops started all over again. A team stayed put at the station all through Sunday and identified a sweeper who had even given Banerjee Rs 100 to help the man on his journey. From Banerjee’s account, the porter guessed that he was headed towards Budge Budge. He then ensured Banerjee boarded a Budge Budge-bound train.
“We sent out an alert to GRP and Budge Budge police. We went from one railway station to another on the line between Sealdah and Budge Budge. It was finally on Monday morning that someone noticed Banerjee spending the night inside an ATM located close to the Budge Budge railway station and brought him to police.”
Banerjee’s daughter Shyamashree said: “The cops’ promptness was beyond expectation. I had undergone an operation on October 10. Though I recovered, my father went into a sort of depression.”