A group of college students from Calcutta visiting a water theme park in Hooghly with their teacher were allegedly assaulted on Sunday for protesting against a stranger video-recording their every move inside the rain dance enclosure. Their ordeal was made worse by two police stations that refused to accept the complaint until multiple enquiries by Metro on Monday morning.
"A middle-aged person who was using the rain dance facility in the park was video-recording my students on his mobile phone. I snatched his phone and alerted a male member of the security staff there. In his presence, I deleted the video and handed the phone back to the person," states the complaint, filed by the lady teacher who had accompanied the group of 11 girls and three boys.
She said the security guards at Aqua Marina in Chinsurah hurled abuse at her students rather than stand up for them. They also accused her students of "video-recording others", she added.
"After some verbal abuse, the female guards assaulted my students. Fearing a risk to life and limb, we left the place in a hurry," recounts the complaint.
The medical report of one of the students who was examined at NRS Medical College and Hospital on Sunday confirms that she had been kicked in the abdomen. "There are multiple scratch marks on her right forearm and cheek," states the report.
The group, which included undergraduate and postgraduate students from reputable institutions, had left Aqua Marina immediately after the incident, only to realise that lodging a complaint would invite more harassment.
Baranagar police station along BT Road, the first one they spotted on their way back to Calcutta, allegedly did not accept the complaint by saying that Chinsurah in Hooghly was outside its jurisdiction.
Muchipara police station of central Calcutta, where the lady teacher lives, didn't accept the complaint either. An officer suggested that she address her complaint to the police chief of Hooghly district.
When Metro contacted Muchipara police station on Monday morning to ask why the complaint wasn't accepted, an officer admitted that the colleague who was on duty the previous day should have done so. Baranagar police station repeated the explanation that the "spot of occurrence" was beyond its jurisdiction.
Abhijit Biswas, the owner of the theme park, contested the allegations. "No one misbehaved with the girls," he said.
But he did admit that someone from his office requested the lady teacher on Monday morning not to lodge a police complaint. "The request was made because a complaint would affect our reputation," he said.
According to one of the girls in the group, members of the security staff at the theme park had argued that they couldn't object to someone video-recording them since they were doing the same thing. "Madam tried to reason with them that we were video-recording ourselves, not others. But they would have none of it," she recounted.
"A member of the security staff even accused us of dancing indecently, saying that it encouraged the stranger to video-record us. We suspect he was taking sides because the person must be a local resident."
On Monday morning, the lady teacher wondered why it took enquiries by Metro for the police to take cognisance of her complaint. Muchipara police station later said that it would follow procedure and forward the complaint to Chinsurah police station.
Asked about the procedure, an officer at the police station said a copy of the general diary would be sent to Bankshall court.
"The court would forward the complaint to the chief judicial magistrate of Chinsurah court, who would ask Chinsurah police station to probe the incident."
One of the students intends to send a complaint through Speed Post to the superintendent of police, Hooghly.
