The Chicken-Licken :
The Chicken-Licken
(It’s almost 12 AM. Tossing and turning in bed, I try to catch some sleep. But sleep doesn’t come easily. The image of that 31-year-old keeps coming and haunting my mind.
What kind of lady was Mita Deb? Must have been a brilliant student. One doesn’t cross the MBBS hurdle without academic brilliance. I read in the news that she was the extroverted type. Was she an obedient daughter or rebellious?
I have always been apolitical and far be it from my thoughts to be disrespectful to the still fresh memory of the diseased. But something, call it a voice in my head, cries foul and wants justice and I find myself frantically typing on my mobile…..)
My mind then goes to the scene of the crime on that fatal day. I heard it that she had a 36-hour-duty on that fatal night. Was she the only one on duty or there were some other doctors, interns helping the patients along with her? And who assigns this duty roaster in that famed medical college?
I am from the land of Bomkesh Bakshi, Feluda and Kiriti Roy. My mind starts encouraging me to be imaginative, speculative and a little daring. It is around 1.30 at night. (I ain’t counting much on the students’ reports). Some interns along with Mita head towards the hospital canteen. Sorry, I don’t know if the canteen was on the ground floor or on the fourth. Whatever, there were some 5 of them altogether. And at least 1 of these 5 is admittedly not that goody-goody type. S/he is waiting for the dinner to be over, so that Mita can be persuaded to proceed to the Seminar Room.
This character is at present nowhere to be seen. Back home, s/he has been going through the papers, hanging on to the news, watching the videos for heaving a sigh of relief. All the evidence has been vandalized. Forget about Kolkata Police (they were known to be a smart lot aeons of years ago). Even the CBI would have a hard time trying to unearth some evidence. S/he decides to visit the scene of the crime at a more convenient time when things have quitened down a bit. S/he chuckles to him/herself. Over confident s/he is and this is what will eventually lead to her/his downfall.
Anyway, let’s get to the canteen for the time being. Somebody must have served them the food or did they self-serve? This man/woman may be keeping quiet right now but can be of immense value, especially if s/he gave the late diners the impression that s/he was drooling while in reality her/his ears were picking up those apparently useless pieces of the conversation, unknown to all 5 of them.
This waiter or whoever can be of great help to the investigators. Enough of the canteen scene. They were done with dinner. A couple of them had already left. But the messenger was still waiting with Mita, just to make sure that she did head towards the Seminar Room for a brief rest and respite. They exchange their “good nights” as Mita slowly saunters towards the room. The other diner, probably a girl or woman, finds her getting into the room. Looks up and around to make sure that she was not under the surveillance of the CC camera before taking out her phone and making a call. She had been repeatedly rehearsed about her role that night, much earlier.
Back in the seminar room, Mita selects one of the chairs near the cot and looks at the jotted-down notes. She can discuss a few things with the HoD in the morning.
She yawns and realises that she hadn’t slept for the last 2 days, almost. She looks at her wrist watch. It is 2.15. Time to have a quick nap. She pulls the bedsheet tightly around her and lays her head down.
There is a creaking sound of the door opening. Who is getting into the room at this hour? Then she gets apprehensive. None of those 5 entering, including that bitch, had a normal look on their faces. In fact, as they kept moving towards her direction, 2 of them looked really menacing. Mita, sleep evading from her eyes, had stood up by then. As the woman tried to sit her back down with her hands on her shoulders, she tried forcing them away.
A grave mistake, no doubt as all five of the attackers ( two of them were doctors!) swooned down on her precisely at that moment. She tried pushing the one trying to catch hold of her right arm. And the next moment, she found herself being lifted in the air, flung against the wall – her head thudding against it – before being forced down into the cot. She tried screaming out then but one of the intruders had covered her mouth from the head of the bed. 2 of them had forced her legs apart ( that’s how her pelvic bone was broken finally.) There was a hefty man holding her hands above her shoulders. The pain was excruciating. A fighter that she was, like Vinesh Phogat, she tried to fight them till the end. But finally, like Vinesh, she too cried to herself damp tears of protest, “When I needed you the most, You deserted me, God!” Someone then, throttled her throat from behind. Suffocated, she slithered and swayed to save herself for one last time when the blows on her face started!
Her head by then was recoiling from the way it was struck against the wall. But the sycophants of the Saturn wouldn’t rest without reducing her to a pulp. Mita could feel life ebbing out of her. But when she found someone ripping her clothes apart, the real ordeal began then. The last she could make out was someone trying to climb on her …….
“The c———r is not dead yet.” An expressionless face said.
“Shshsh…..someone might overhear you,” muttered a second.
“Let them. No one can lay a finger on me. I own this place, man. And that reminds me to make it look like a stray rape case. That Sujoy is supposed to be sent in any moment now. An easy scapegoat. He’s been offered a handsome reward in case things go out of control… So, hurry up and get out of the room, Mates. Good riddance of that f—–g bitch.” The third one concluded.
Sujoy Roy, that pimp, was all smile while heading that desolate way. The sluts these days were no pleasure givers and all money-minded. He moved on his wobbly feet as there came a low moaning sound from the cot up ahead. It was still moving the slow, laborious, painful movements of death.
Sujay made sure the earbuds were in place as he started unzipping his pants……
In the next two hours, there would be chicken cooking in his quarters. But before that, he had to dispense with this ‘reduced to a chicken-licken state’ in bed ….
