A gun lies near Bhangabera bridge from where the police action started on Wednesday. On Sunday, the Samsabad gram panchayat office near Tekhali was attacked by villagers belonging to the anti-acquisition brigade, who allegedly looted about 4,000 kg rice. CPM leaders alleged the revenue inspector’s office was ransacked and roads were dug up in two places in the Daudpur panchayat area. Picture by Pradip Sanyal

Tamluk, March 18: Supriya Jana, who died in the police firing on Wednesday, was hit in the head by a sharp weapon, the post-mortem report has revealed.

“The upper part of the head was chopped off by a heavy but sharp weapon. A portion of the skull was sliced off in the blow. This doesn’t happen in a bullet injury, which has more of a blast effect on the internal organs,” it says.

The preliminary post-mortem reports of five victims submitted to the CBI last night show that bullets alone did not fell the villagers resisting the entry of policemen into Nandigram — sharp weapons and bombs were also used, raising the possibility that people other than security forces were involved.

Gobinda Das of Kalicharanpur had stab injuries in the right side of his chest. The wounds are long and blackish — one near the lower chest and abdomen and another in the upper part, the report says. Das, who also had a bullet injury in his chest, appears to have been stabbed twice.

Both Jana and Das would have been attacked with sharp weapons from close range.

The bullet injuries on the dead — Jana, too, was hit by one on her back — were not from point-blank shots, though. They were fired from nearly 900 metres away, the hospital reports say.

If the post-mortem reports have revealed the use of sharp weapons, the multiple lacerations all over the back and buttocks of Tapasi Das, admitted to SSKM Hospital in a serious condition, point to the use of bombs.

“The multiple lacerations happened due to a number of splinters embedded in her flesh, caused typically by bombs,” said a surgeon who operated on Tapasi in Tamluk before she was referred to Calcutta.

“Tear gas shells do not explode and let loose splinters, at least not the ones used by our police force. If something like this happens, it’s only one case in a thousand. Wounds of a lacerating and tattooing nature occur in victims only from bomb splinters,” said a senior IPS officer.

Bombs, along with pistols, ammunition, CPM flags and police helmets, were seized when the CBI yesterday arrested 10 men outside Nandigram.

A Tamluk hospital doctor said: “A look at all the 14 bodies in the morgue helped us reconstruct the scene of action. It is evident the locals did not have bombs in their hands or they would not have let so many attackers come within striking distance. Also, they didn’t cause any serious injuries to the policemen.”

Police had said they opened fire because villagers were hurling bombs at them.

The CBI is unhappy the hospital has not handed over the remaining nine post- mortem reports. Hospital superintendent Sabitendra Patra said they were short of doctors.

and had to wait for them to come from Calcutta and Midnapore.