BENGALURU: A 36-year-old police head constable, who was lodged in the Central jail at Parappana Agrahara committed suicide by hanging at his cell in the hospital block on Tuesday. The jail staff rushed him to Victoria Hospital where he was declared brought dead.Subhash Chandra, a head constable with the City Armed Reserve (CAR), was arrested by Sampigehalli police in May on charges of killing his wife Veena, daughter Manya (3) and son Pruthvi (2) before consuming poison himself.
However, he survived after the treatment and was later handed over to judicial custody. His family was residing at the police quarter s . Subash’s older brother Kotresh noticed the incident and alerted Sampigehalli police. A senior jail official said the incident occurred around 7.35am. Subhash had hanged himself from the window of the hospital block.Since he was being treated for depression, he was shifted to the hospital barracks three months ago. Earlier, he was put up in the common barracks.
Subhash sent out two other inmates of the cell to bring him breakfast. After they left, he tied his lungi to a window of the cell and hanged himself. When the other cellmates returned with breakfast, they found his body hanging and raised an alarm. One of the jail staffers, Veeresh, rushed to the cell and cut down Subash and took him to the hospital on the first floor for first aid.
On the insistence of the doctors, Subash was rushed in the jail ambulance to Victoria Hospital where he was declared brought dead.“On Monday, he underwent counselling and was under observation for more than half an hour. There are more than 60 inmates in the hospital barracks. They were shocked by the incident and did not have breakfast when they learned about the suicide.“An enquiry has been ordered to ascertain if there were any security lapses at the jail premise” the officer added.On May 23, police who recovered some pesticide and rat poison from his house, learned that Subhash owed a lot of money and hence took the extreme step. Later, police also uncovered the fact that he was into cricket betting and had lost heavily in the last IPL season.
Subhash hailed from Hagaribommanahalli in Ballari district.He had got married four years ago and Subhash joined the police force in 2006. Six months before the killing, he was promoted as head constable and was attached with CAR headquarters.He was posted as gunman at the CM’s home office ‘Krishna’ for the past few months.
I have doubts over his death, says brother
“Our family did not appeal before the court thinking that the jail is safe for him as he earlier attempted for suicide. Now I am shocked about the safety measures in the jail and I blame the staff for my brother’s death. The jail officials did not file a complaint untill I approached Parappana Agrahara police station. I had to wait there for three hours” Kotresh, older brother of Subhash told Express.
“I did not get any response from jail officials after the incident. Due to their delay in filing FIR, the postmortem was postponed to Wednesday. I need to take the body to my hometown 400 km away. The jail staff acted after an officer from CAR forced them to conduct the procedures soon. It is another shock for me,” he alleged. “Two weeks ago, I had met him at the visitor’s room and he inquired about the health of my parents,” Kotresh added.