The Times of India: Pune: Wednesday, March 26, 2014.
Tired of the
"harassment" he and his family were facing for years, RTI activist
Vilas Dattatreya Baravkar (52) committed suicide in his Chakan home in Pune on
Tuesday morning.
In his
four-page suicide note written on a Rs 100 stamp paper, Baravkar named 78
people, including senior police officers, relatives and villagers, and alleged
that they had been harassing him and his family for several years.
In his note,
Baravkar said that he had filed RTI applications to help people, but his
opponents and even the police were against him. He alleged that some people,
including policemen, had twice hatched a plot to eliminate him-in 2007-08 and
in 2010.
In the note,
Baravkar also asked his wife and children to end their lives as anti-social
elements would not "let them live peacefully".
Vijaykumar
Magar, additional superintendent of police (Pune rural), told TOI that Baravkar
did not make any specific allegation against the people he mentioned in the
note, but they will investigate the matter.
Baravkar had
police protection since 2010, which he had sought after the murder of RTI
activist Satish Shetty. In his suicide note, Baravkar clarified that the armed
guard had nothing to do with his decision to end life.
Baravkar's
lawyer Sachin Thombre told TOI that the activist had unearthed illegal
construction activities in Chakan and Khed areas and had registered cases
against certain individuals. The matter was being heard in the district and
sessions court, and Baravkar had even attended the hearing on Monday.
Thombre had
told the court on Monday that his client was not getting justice as the case
was repeatedly getting adjourned on the request of the accused. When the matter
came up for hearing on Tuesday, Thombre informed the court that the RTI
activist had ended his life.
Relatives
said Baravkar had been visibly upset since Monday. He had spoken to his
son-in-law Sushil Shevkare, on Monday night about "some people" who
were harassing him. "He said he had suffered a loss because of them. He
was looking depressed," said Shevkare. The activist's wife told the police
that Baravkar had sat in his car writing something until late on Monday night,
which the police suspect was the suicide note. He went to sleep after midnight.
Kishor Patil,
assistant inspector of the Chakan police station, said that at 7.30am,
Baravkar's wife realized that he had not woken up. "When she knocked on
the door, there was no response. After some time, she looked inside the room
from the window and found him hanging from a rope from the ceiling," Patil
said.
Her son and
relatives broke open the door and took him to a nearby hospital, where he was
declared dead. "The post-mortem report stated that Baravkar died due to
asphyxiation," Patil said.
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