A DMK panchayat union ward councillor was booked in connection with the alleged suicide of a village panchayat official near Tamil Nadu’s Vellore following complaints that the ruling party’s leader had been threatening him after taking money promising a government job for a relative, according to the police.
The police said DMK panchayat union ward councillor V Hari was booked under the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989, and Section 306 (abetment of suicide) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) after the victim, G Rajasekar, 39, left a suicide note.
Rajasekar’s wife, R Gandhimathi, 29, found the body of her husband in their house on Friday night when she broke open the door as he was not responding.
“Rajasekar worked at the Ramanayinikuppam village panchayat office in Anaicut, near Vellore, for about 13 years. The DMK councillor Hari allegedly took Rs 2.50 lakh from Rajasekar promising a job for his brother at a ration shop. After no sign of getting the job, Rajasekar asked Hari and demanded the money back. But Hari started harassing him and threatened that he would be transferred out of the village panchayat office,” a police officer said, referring to the complaint filed by the victim’s wife Gandhimathi and the note recovered from Rajasekar’s house.
As the victim’s family and local people refused to take his body after the postmortem on Saturday and organised a protest demanding the arrest of Hari, the police stepped in and promise action. Superintendent of police S Rajesh Kannan also visited the spot to monitor the probe.
This article first appeared on indianexpress.com