“Dadun, tumi kobey ashbey (Grandpa, when will you visit us)?” Simanta’s affectionate query will haunt Bijoy Das forever.

A fortnight ago, when the septuagenarian visited daughter Swati at her Tollygunge residence, his three-year-old grandson had accompanied his father Shibendu to see him off.

The boy asked his grandfather when he would come to see them next.

Bijoy Das was never to see little Simanta again.

“Over these years, it never appeared to us that Rumi (Swati) was in trouble or there were any problems within the family. She was happy with Shibendu… Even a few months ago, he gave her a cell phone. One could never have imagined their end would come like this,” said Das.

The words reverberated across the room on Satchashi Road, in Sinthee, filled with Swati’s presence — the family album, the way she had neatly arranged her father’s medallions and her wedding picture in a frame.

From February 9, 2000, when the two were married, Shibendu never appeared to be a man in trouble, claimed his father- in-law.

The couple would visit Sinthee regularly and “every time, Shibendu would come with a pile of gifts”. Before leaving, the son-in-law would always bend down to touch the feet of the elders at Swati’s home.

“He would always crack jokes… There was no way one could make out that he was in any kind of trouble. My daughter never had any complaints. Just once, immediately after marriage, she had cribbed about his (Shibendu’s) short temper,” added Swati’s mother, Karabi.

For the Das’, their world revolved around the twin sisters, Swati and Saswati.

After clearing the Higher Secondary examinations from Rajkumari Girls’ High School, the two completed their graduation from Women’s College. Swati was married the year she cleared her graduation, while Saswati married Snigdhajyoti Pal two years later.

“Swati’s second son was born in August and Saswati’s in May. We had planned to organise the mukhey bhat (rice ceremony) for the two in Sinthee very soon. But then…,” the grandfather broke down on Tuesday.

As the man who has won medals for walking, both in India and abroad, struggled to find his feet, on the bed, his wife clings on to the album full of their daughter’s wedding pictures.

A hush descends over the Das family. “Why don’t we find out the tantrik who apparently tried his tricks on Shibendu?” offers a member of the family, physician Sailen Pal.

“We don’t want anything. Just ensure that if someone had a hand in this, he is punished,” says mother Kabari Das, softly but firmly.