Pune:
In a shocking new revelation in the IBM techie Darshana Tongare murder case, police control room officials said they had received a call on the day of the murder from an eyewitness. The caller, however, cut the line without speaking to the constable who answered the phone.
24-year-old Niranjan Badde was the first to reach the crime spot and had chased Tongare's assailant. Badde had said that despite repeated attempts to reach the police control room, he had been unable to get through.
This led to an uproar, forcing control room officials to check the call details on August 30.
"An eyewitness who wants to share some information keeps on trying till he gets through to the police. But in the case of Badde, he only called once, and he did get through to the constable," said a senior officer attached to control room. "But he hung up without saying anything and we have the recorded proof of this fact."
Investigating officer Police Inspector Nandkumar Bhosale-Patil said, "Sometimes the control room number is busy. In Badde's case, he must have only tried once to contact the control room."
Other control room officials said more than 70 per cent of the calls received by them were either fake or blank calls, but witnesses who want to share information never give up and continue to call till they get the information across.
21-year-old Tongare was attacked with a sharp weapon on her way back home from her office in Yerawada on August 30. The incident took place after her friend Abhijeet Taru dropped her at her residence in Suvarna Park. Once Taru left, a man in his twenties stabbed Darshana in the stomach.
As Tongare screamed for help, Badde, a software engineer, stopped to help her. As Darshana pointed in the direction of a youth, Badde made an unsuccessful attempt to chase the youth before calling the police control room.