Kolkata, May 7: Miscreants threw some unidentified liquid chemical on six people, most of them women, from a running taxi on Sunday night on a posh area in south Kolkata, eyewitnesses and police said on Monday.

The taxi has been identified from the CCTV footage from a nearby building.

"A case has been registered and the investigation is still going on. The liquid thrown was not acid and officially we cannot declare what it was. It was something like battery water," a Sub Inspector of Rabindra Sarobar Police Station told IANS.

One of the victims claimed that the chemical was either some acid used in cars or that used in toilets.

"Had there been personal enmity then someone would have been attacked, but in this case, the five to six people who were attacked don't even know each other," said an eye witness.

The owner of the car has been identified and interrogated by the police.

"I visited the police station where the case has been registered and spoke to the officials. They told me that the driver is absconding leaving behind the car.

"When I tried to locate him at his residence where he lived with his mother, I found the house locked and none of them was there," the owner said.

The victims had no inkling of the attack as the car was about to pass by.

"We didn't realise anything of this sort. Initially I thought it to be dirty water or something. As it started burning I had to rinse it with water. Later, I got to know that many others had been attacked," said a female victim.

"If something of this sort happens in such a posh area, then we won't be able to move out of the house freely. It is very disturbing," she added.

As per the eyewitnesses, there were around four men inside the moving taxi.

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New Delhi: The Union Ministry of Culture allegedly spent Rs 76.13 lakh on print advertisements marking the 100-year celebrations of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), according to a Right to Information (RTI) reply.

The information was sought by RTI activist Ajay Basudev Bose, who filed an application seeking details on expenditure incurred by the ministry for advertisements commemorating the RSS centenary.

Bose shared a picture of the reply from the ministry on his official ‘X’ handle.

“It is informed that an amount of Rs 76,13,129 has been spent on advertisement given in various print media by the Ministry of Culture on the occasion of the completion of 100 years of RSS,” the government’s reply stated.

Bose questioned the expenditure in the post X, “when Everyone knows RSS is Not Registered & Does not Pay any Tax is it justified to spend Tax Payers Money on such Private event??”

Reacting to the development, Karnataka’s IT-BT and Panchayat Raj Minister Priyank Kharge also criticised the spending.

In a post on X, he asked why public money was being used for what he described as a “private ideological project.”

"Modi Sarkar spent Rs 76,13,129 of public money on newspaper advertisements to celebrate 100 years of the RSS. Why is Government spending taxpayers money on an unregistered, non-tax-paying organisation to celebrate their centenary?," he added. 

According to reports, the RSS describes itself as a volunteer-based organisation and has stated that it functions as a body of individuals rather than a registered entity.

Founded by Keshav Baliram Hedgewar in 1925, the organisation is marking its centenary year beginning from Vijaydashami in 2025, with the milestone observed on October 2.