Biswajit Poddar of Salt Lake, who went on a trek to Sandakphu, returned to the city in a coffin on Thursday afternoon.

Poddar, 35, died on Tuesday night after taking ill during the trek. This was his first visit to Sandakphu, Bengal's highest peak at 11,941ft.

The product manager with Fi-Tek, an US-based company with an office in Sector V, is survived by wife Tumpa and a four-year-old son. Poddar and his family stayed with his mother, elder brother Biprajit and sister-in-law in CL Block.

"While we regularly visit Darjeeling, this was our first trip to Sandakphu," said D. Mukherjee, one of his colleagues. "We started our trek from Maneyjbhanjyan on March 18 and reached Sandakphu on March 21. We started trekking from Sandakphu to Phalut around 8am on Tuesday. But after about 3km, Poddar started complaining of leg pain."

While the trek from Maneyjbhanjyan is an uphill climb, the walk from Sandakphu to Phalut (21km) is relatively downhill till the last stretch.

Poddar's sister-in-law said he had told them that he was going on a trek to Sandakphu with three colleagues.

"When Poddar complained of leg pain, his friends arranged for a vehicle to take him and a guide to Phalut," a police officer in Darjeeling said. His colleagues continued with the trek and reached Phalut around 4pm, he said.

Poddar had reached a guest house in Phalut around 12.30pm. "The colleagues later found him lying on a bed with difficulty in breathing," the officer said. His colleagues decided to take him to Darjeeling and the group left Phalut around 6pm. "His condition seems to have worsened on the way. Poddar was declared brought dead at Darjeeling District Hospital," the officer said.

Kasba firing

Amardeep Singh, 28, arrested on Wednesday in connection with a shooting in Kasba, had the revolver used in the shooting for over five years without a licence, police said.

Singh claimed he had found the gun, along with two improvised firearms, in a garbage vat in 2011. "He said he had alerted Kasba police station about the guns in the vat. But he suppressed the fact that he had kept one for himself," an officer of Kasba police station said.

On Wednesday, cops arrested Mohan Shaw on the charge of hitting Debasish Mandal of Swinhoe Lane with his car. After the police took away Shaw from the spot, Singh picked a fight with Mandal and fired two rounds at him, injuring him in the leg.

Residents say Singh is Shaw's associate.

The officer said 2011 police records have corroborated Singh's claim. "But he had kept the best among the three."