The shooting of a ninth-standard student in Kharagpur was not a gang attack, but an accidental discharge from an illegally held pistol at a friend’s house, police said as three men were arrested in connection with the incident.
The injured student, identified as Akshay Kumar Jha, remains under treatment at a private hospital in Kolkata. Police said the firearm went off when Akshay allegedly picked it up and handled it out of curiosity while visiting the home of his friend Sagar Kumar in Kharagpur’s Old Settlement area.
According to the investigation, Akshay, a student of a railway school in the Golbazar area, visited Sagar’s house at about 11am on Wednesday. Police said Sagar went to the toilet while the pistol remained inside the house. Akshay then noticed the weapon and began handling it, causing a bullet to fire and enter the area near his throat.
Police said Sagar was initially detained after the incident because investigators found inconsistencies in his account. The account later examined by the police was that Sagar called a friend after the shooting. That friend arrived with two others, and they took Akshay to Kharagpur Railway Main Hospital. The group allegedly created a false story suggesting that a criminal gang had fired at the student to avoid immediate consequences.
The three arrested men are Sagar Kumar, 23, Kola Yogeshwar Rao, 23, and Bishal Jana, 22. All three are residents of the Old Settlement area in Ward 20 of Kharagpur municipality. Police have accused them of attempting to destroy evidence, illegally possessing a firearm and concealing information about the incident.
During a search of Sagar’s house, police recovered a 9mm pistol and three live cartridges, along with two empty cartridge cases and a blood-stained shirt believed to belong to Akshay. The recovered items have been sent for forensic examination. Police said the pistol belonged to Sagar’s father, Venkata Prasad Rao, and had remained in the house after his death. The firearm was allegedly held illegally.
A Kharagpur court on Thursday ordered 10 days of police custody for the arrested men. The investigation will examine the origin and ownership of the weapon, the sequence of events inside the house and the alleged attempt to mislead investigators.
The incident initially raised concerns about a possible return of organised criminal violence in Kharagpur. Police Superintendent Papiya Sultana said there was no gang war or attack in the shooting. She said the police would not allow the city’s past violence to return and that searches would be conducted at the homes of suspected mafia groups to recover illegal weapons.
The police statement also referred to the 2022 killing of land dealer Prasad, described as a close associate of former Kharagpur mafia figure Shreenu Naidu, who was shot dead on June 27 that year. The current investigation remains focused on the firearm recovered from Sagar’s house and the circumstances in which Akshay was injured.
