A woman was robbed at 4.45pm on Saturday when the day was still sunny and bright.
Three suspects came on a bike, two of them without even bothering to cover their heads.
Closed-circuit TV cameras on Selimpur Road in Dhakuria captured their images.
But Kolkata Police are yet to arrest them.
The daylight snatching in the heart of Calcutta and the police’s inability to make a breakthrough in over 48 hours is, according to many, enough to break the city’s confidence in the police force.
Several retired officers once involved in policing in the city said snatchers were usually not part of an organised crime racket and ideally it should not take so long to nab them.
That the police have not been able to do so suggests a weak intelligence network and the failure of policing at the ground level, said many.
“Till now, we have not seen any pro-activeness from the police. We are yet to get any news (about the case),” said Piyali De Ray, 57, whose necklace the three men had snatched.
“I have no faith left in the police. The CCTV footage is the only evidence that I was robbed. Otherwise, no one would have even believed me…. Calcutta has become a city of the old. There are no jobs, no opportunities. We cannot have our children with us keeping their future in mind,” said Piyali whose son lives in Bangalore.
The police said a joint team from Garfa police station and officers of the detective department were working together to identify the men seen in the footage.
“We are also checking the adjoining areas of Sonarpur and Baruipur,” said a senior officer of the south suburban division.
A team of officers from the detective department visited the spot and recorded Piyali’s statement on Monday evening.
The daylight snatching prompted some elderly residents in the neighbourhood to rush to install CCTV cameras at their homes.
“My mother stays alone the entire time I am away at office. If a woman can be robbed in daylight like this, what can happen to an elderly woman alone at home? I have decided to install CCTV cameras to secure the entry and exit points of my home. I will monitor the footage on my phone,” said a resident of Dhakuria’s Pal Para, not far from the spot where the snatching was reported.
The incident has again laid bare the problems thousands of elderly Calcuttans face. Piyali’s husband Sankha De Ray, 60, said: “I am feeling extremely insecure now. We are seriously considering shifting to Bangalore where our son lives.”
An elderly resident of the same neighbourhood said there was hardly any police presence in the area. “We hardly see any patrol in the area. Criminals know that they will not be caught. That is why they could attempt such a daring attack in broad daylight,” the woman said.
Calcutta has seen a spurt of robberies and armed attacks, especially on the elderly.
A retired officer, who has worked for several decades solving specialised cases of crime, said cyber crimes can be detected essentially with electronic evidence.
“But for traditional crimes like robbery, theft and murder, the police need to have the support of both electronic evidence and human intelligence to solve a case. There is no substitute for human intelligence,” the retired cop said.
Once very good at it, Kolkata Police seems to have lost touch with the ground.