Candlelight prayer for Pune terror victims in Kolkata
By IANSMonday, February 15, 2010
KOLKATA - Students and alumni of Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan Monday gathered at the school premises here to pray for their departed friends Ankik Dhar, Anindi Dhar and Shilpa Goyenka who were killed in the Pune terror strike Saturday.
About 70 students, especially the batchmates of the deceased, along with school teachers held a condolence meeting with candle lights at the school hall in Kolkata’s posh satellite township Salt Lake. They also condemned the bombing that killed nine people and left 60 injured.
A minute’s silence was observed in memory of all the three terror victims.
“We gathered to pray for their souls. We held a condolence meeting for almost one hour with candle lights,” Chitrangada Chakraborty, a classmate of Anindi, told IANS.
Siblings Ankik, 24, and Anandi, 19, and their friend Shilpa, 23, were students of Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan at Salt Lake.
“It is really sad that innocent people are falling prey to terror attacks across the country,” Chakraborty said, adding the loss of this brother-sister duo was very tragic as both were extremely good in studies and died at a tender age.
“The authorities have decided to keep the school closed Wednesday,” she said.
Ankik and Anandi were residents of Kolkata’s Salt Lake sector-I while Shilpa lived at Lake Town area on the eastern fringes of the city.
Ankik, who passed out from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT)-Kharagpur, worked at a private firm in Mumbai. His sister Anindi was a student of Fergusson College in Pune. Shilpa, a childhood friend of Ankik who died in the same attack, also worked in Mumbai.
Meanwhile, students of the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT)-Kharagpur took out a candlelight march Sunday night from Patel Hostel, where Ankik used to stay when he was a student. The procession covered all hostels at the IIT-Kharagpur premises and finally ended at the Patel Hostel.
Informed sources said that Shilpa’s body was brought to Kolkata Sunday night and her last rites were performed at northern Kolkata’s Nimtala crematorium. The Dhar siblings were cremated in Pune.
