LUCKNOW: Shattered by the death of his two-and-a-half-year-old son, who reportedly died after falling into a water-filled pothole on Wednesday, a police constable in Etawah district carried his son’s body to the office of the district senior superintendent of police (SSP) alleging torture by not granting him the leave to take care of his ailing wife and two children.
Constable Sonu Chowdhary, posted in the Quick Response Team (QRT) of Etawah police at Baidpura, said his son’s death was a result of him being occupied with police work for most of his time.
As per the sources, while Sonu was getting ready to leave for duty on Wednesday, his two sons—Shivendra, 5, and Golu, 2.5, got out of the house to find the doors open and started playing at an adjacent plot. Sonu’s wife Kavita is bedridden after a recent abdominal surgery. After some time, Shivendra
returned, but Golu did not come back home.
On asking the neighbours, when Sonu did not get the information about the whereabouts of his younger son, he went out to the plot finding his body floating in a pothole filled with sewage water.
Sonu took out Golu and rushed him to a nearby hospital where the doctors declared him dead upon arrival. This led the agitated Sonu to take the body to the SSP office claiming that he was not granted leave by the seniors even on genuine grounds, as he had to take care of his two sons with his wife bed-ridden.
The officials consoled the constable and persuaded him to go back to his house in Ekta colony. Sonu Chowdhary lives with his family in a two-room rented house on the ground floor of a building. He stated that owing to the illness of his wife since December 31, he had applied for leave with the office of SP (city) Kapil Dev on January 7.
Other officials, who took Chowdhary to his house, accompanied him during the burial of his son. SSP Etawah, Jai Prakash Singh said an inquiry was ordered.