08-15-2008, 08:21 AM
<b>Hunt for martyr skull in cop vaults</b>
14 Aug 2008, 0408 hrs IST, Jhimli Mukherjee Pandey & Krishnendu Bandyopadhyay,TNN
KOLKATA: Somewhere in the vaults of the Kolkata Police records section is a skull with two bullet holes. It holds the key to solving a century-old mystery involving a legendary freedom fighter - and also one of the most macabre chapters of the city police's history during the Raj days.
Many believe the skull is that of Prafulla Chaki, who shot himself in August 1908 after the failed attack on magistrate Kingsford with fellow revolutionary Khudiram Bose.
For decades, Kolkata Police has been trying to solve the mystery. Now, on the 100th anniversary of Chaki's martyrdom, a DNA test will reveal if the skull is a national treasure or a hoax. If it turns out to be Chaki's, it will find pride of place in the Police Museum.
Chaki and Khudiram had hurled bombs at a carriage they thought was Kingsford's, but ended up killing two British women instead. Chaki, on the run, was cornered by police at Samastipur railway station in Bihar.
It was a Bengali officer of Calcutta Police, Nandalal Bandopadhyay, who saw through his disguise and trapped him. Chaki was then living under the false name of Dinesh Ray.
Instead of surrendering, he chose to shoot himself in the head - he died a free man.
Chaki's trial took place after his death. Calcutta High Court ordered the production of his remains to prove that he was not Dinesh Ray. Officers of Calcutta Police severed the head from a body believed to be Chaki's and brought it to the city preserved in tincture iodine. Court records say it was produced before the judge but what happened after that is shrouded in mystery.
It is believed that P C Lahiri, an inspector of Calcutta Police, kept the head buried in his own garden on Free School Street (where Dunlop House came up later). When the Intelligence Branch office was set up in 1916, the head was brought here. After Independence, it was exhumed, cleaned up and sent to a museum at the Police Training School (PTS).
There it stayed for a long time until historian Amalendu De discovered it in 1994-95. Then police commissioner Tushar Talukdar and Nihar Ranjan Roy, officer-in-charge of the detective department's crime records section, took up the case.
"It came as a huge surprise to us that the skull could be Prafulla Chaki's. We decided to trace its authenticity so that it could be installed with full honour, instead of being tucked away in anonymity," Talukdar told TOI on Wednesday.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/article...8,prtpage-1.cms
14 Aug 2008, 0408 hrs IST, Jhimli Mukherjee Pandey & Krishnendu Bandyopadhyay,TNN
KOLKATA: Somewhere in the vaults of the Kolkata Police records section is a skull with two bullet holes. It holds the key to solving a century-old mystery involving a legendary freedom fighter - and also one of the most macabre chapters of the city police's history during the Raj days.
Many believe the skull is that of Prafulla Chaki, who shot himself in August 1908 after the failed attack on magistrate Kingsford with fellow revolutionary Khudiram Bose.
For decades, Kolkata Police has been trying to solve the mystery. Now, on the 100th anniversary of Chaki's martyrdom, a DNA test will reveal if the skull is a national treasure or a hoax. If it turns out to be Chaki's, it will find pride of place in the Police Museum.
Chaki and Khudiram had hurled bombs at a carriage they thought was Kingsford's, but ended up killing two British women instead. Chaki, on the run, was cornered by police at Samastipur railway station in Bihar.
It was a Bengali officer of Calcutta Police, Nandalal Bandopadhyay, who saw through his disguise and trapped him. Chaki was then living under the false name of Dinesh Ray.
Instead of surrendering, he chose to shoot himself in the head - he died a free man.
Chaki's trial took place after his death. Calcutta High Court ordered the production of his remains to prove that he was not Dinesh Ray. Officers of Calcutta Police severed the head from a body believed to be Chaki's and brought it to the city preserved in tincture iodine. Court records say it was produced before the judge but what happened after that is shrouded in mystery.
It is believed that P C Lahiri, an inspector of Calcutta Police, kept the head buried in his own garden on Free School Street (where Dunlop House came up later). When the Intelligence Branch office was set up in 1916, the head was brought here. After Independence, it was exhumed, cleaned up and sent to a museum at the Police Training School (PTS).
There it stayed for a long time until historian Amalendu De discovered it in 1994-95. Then police commissioner Tushar Talukdar and Nihar Ranjan Roy, officer-in-charge of the detective department's crime records section, took up the case.
"It came as a huge surprise to us that the skull could be Prafulla Chaki's. We decided to trace its authenticity so that it could be installed with full honour, instead of being tucked away in anonymity," Talukdar told TOI on Wednesday.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/article...8,prtpage-1.cms