Six people died on Wednesday in West Bengal’s Howrah district under mysterious circumstances, police said. Locals said the six died after consuming illicit liquor from an outlet in the Malipanchghora area and ransacked the outlet. But the police said they will wait for the autopsy report to confirm the cause of death.
“Six persons have died this morning. Their bodies have been sent for postmortem. We will be able to ascertain the cause of death after the autopsy reports come in,” said Praveen Tripathi, commissioner of Howrah city police.
Locals claimed that some other people had died in the nearby areas after consuming liquor from the same outlet over the past month but they were cremated by their families without informing the police.
Tripathi said the local police hadn’t heard anything of this sort in the past.
“We have no such information nor have received any such complaints. Also, we have not come across any such outlet or hideout in the area from where illicit liquor was being sold,” said Tripathi.
But this is not the first time that people have attributed the death of family members to illicit liquor. When eight people died in East Burdwan district earlier this month, their family claimed that the victims consumed country liquor before their death. But officials denied the connection.
“The excise department checked samples of the liquor from the store from where some of them consumed alcohol the previous night. They didn’t find any aberration. So it may not be because of alcohol. We are waiting for the viscera reports,” said Kamanasish Sen of East Burdwan district.