The Nissan Micra employed to stall Chandranath Rath’s SUV during his murder carried a genuine registration number — but one belonging to an entirely different car parked in a Siliguri resident’s garage.
The chassis number had been scraped off at multiple points, investigators said. The same tactic had been used on a getaway motorbike seized by police: real number, wrong vehicle.
The silver Micra, abandoned near the crime scene, led the police to a Siliguri address. The owner, William Joseph, received a call close to midnight on Wednesday from Calcutta police asking where his car was. When he said it was with him, they told him his number plate had been used in a murder.
“They asked me to send my car details along with its photograph,” Joseph told The Telegraph. He was subsequently summoned by the Siliguri police commissionerate and questioned for about three hours before being let go.
Joseph suspects the number was lifted from a photograph he had uploaded on an online car-sale portal roughly two weeks ago. His white Micra sat outside his home throughout Wednesday night — while a similar car bearing its number was used in a murder 550km away.
On Thursday afternoon, the police seized an apparently abandoned motorcycle from Barasat. It’s number was registered in the name of Bibhas Kumar Bhattacharya, of Quarter No. AB 7/12, Gurudwara Road, Burnpur, Hirapur, Burdwan. When investigators visited the address, they found the registered bike in his possession — the same number having been used on the assassins’ vehicle.
Bhattacharya could not be reached for comment.
“It's a clear indication that the operation had been planned for days, and they had taken all possible steps to throw the police investigation off the track,” said an officer attached to the probe.
Investigators say the modus operandi points to a trained, professional outfit with knowledge of how to evade police scrutiny.