BELAGAVI: For the first time after the suicide of SDA Rudresh Yadavannavar at the Belagavi tahsildar’s office three weeks ago, the police have interrogated the accused, tahsildar Basavaraj Nagaral, minister’s PA Somu Dodwadi and FDA Ashok Kabbaliger.
Besides a string of questions over the incident of suicide, the police mainly wanted to know from the tahsildar as to why he deleted the messages shared by Yadavannavar in the official group, that he was committing suicide, hours before he died.
The investigating team asked the tahsildar as to why he deleted Yadavannavar’s message, that he had sent hours before his death, and why he had not gotten in touch with the latter to stop him from taking the extreme step.
Among the few messages which Yadavannavar had shared before his death, he had held the tahsildar, Somu and Kabbaliger responsible for his suicide, and had called upon his colleagues to unitedly fight for justice in the office. The police asked the tahsildar why he did not call Yadavannavar and tried to convince him against ending his life. The police felt that Yadavannavar could have been stopped from taking the extreme step.
Recently, the police officials and several other top government authorities had received an anonymous letter, claiming that some one had murdered Yadavannvar and that he had not commit suicide, giving a new twist to the entire case. The letter had claimed that the tahsildar’s driver had killed Yadavannvar.
It has since come to light that the driver was actually a Gram Sevak in Badal Ankagi village, but was made to work as the tahsildar’s driver. Despite drawing the salary of a Gram Sevak, he was working as the tahsildar’s driver for the past 15 years. Badal Ankalgi villagers have been wondering how he could work as the driver.
It may be recalled the police had not arrested the three accused, including the tahsildar in the suicide case for several days and eventually all of them were able to get anticipatory bail from the local court. A day after getting the anticipatory bail, the tahsildar had even rejoined his duty.
Several BJP leaders had demanded the immediate arrest of all the accused.
