Imphal: Kalikho Pul, who demitted the office of Arunachal Pradesh chief minister last month, allegedly committed suicide at the chief minister’s official bungalow on Tuesday morning.
As the news of his death spread fast and wide, his supporters attacked the official as well as private residences of Deputy Chief Minister Chowna Mein for reasons not known.
The body of 47-year-old Pul was found hanging by a servant in the morning. According to the police, preliminary investigations do not point to any foul play.
“A servant found the body hanging around 9 this morning. We don’t know but possibly he committed suicide at night,” Arunachal’s Director General of Police (DGP) S Nithianandam told Express.
He said a long note, “My Vichar” (my thoughts), was retrieved from the room where the body was found hanging. “But I won’t like to call it a suicide note,” the DGP said, adding “the note along with all other evidence in the room, has been sealed and will be presented before a magistrate”.
Pul held the chief minister’s post for nearly five months before the reinstatement of Nabam Tuki’s Congress government by the Supreme Court last month. He kept staying in the chief minister’s official bungalow even after Pema Khandu took over as the chief minister following Tuki’s stepping down from the post.
Officials said the body had been sent for autopsy.
Earlier, Pul’s supporters hit the streets in Itanagar alleging foul play. They pelted stones at the two residences of the deputy chief minister and vandalized them.
When a coffin was brought, some supporters burnt it. Later, when an ambulance arrived to take body to a hospital, they damaged it. The supporters are demanding that the state government hand over the case to the CBI.
The government announced three-day mourning and a state funeral. The last rites will be performed at Pul’s ancestral village in the state’s Anjaw district on Wednesday. Pul is survived by three wives and four children.