‘Glorification of Suicides Dangerous’ – A K Subbaiah
Madikeri: On a day when the BJP tried to display its show of strength by supporting a huge protest rally in front of the DC’s office here on Friday, on the other side, senior high court advocate and former MLA A K Subbaiah addressed a media meet.
Taking a dig at all the vested interests, who, according to him, had been glorifying the suicide of DySP M K Ganapathi, Subbaiah said that such attempts were detrimental to the society. He opined that a police official committing suicide only proved that he was unfit to hold the post. Suicidal tendencies being a psychiatric issue, making heroes of such persons was not an edifying development, he stressed.
He argued that any suicide was an offence in the first place. Concealing this aspect, attempts were being made to look for scapegoats. The opposition parties and the media, making use of the weakness of the Congress party, were trying to mislead the public, he added.
A message had to be given to the society against suicides and not anything that could drive more people to such acts by glorifying the act.
He revealed several aspects of the case, which the vested interests were trying hard to suppress. Ganapathi had been suspended from service on two occasions when the BJP government was in power.
If he had faced harassment from George or others two years ago, there was no necessity for him to end his life at this stage, he added. He forthright blamed the opposition parties and vested interests for fishing in troubled waters instead of serving the people.
Besides, in a recent interview, Ganapathi had expressed happiness over his reinstatement and transfer to Mangaluru. When he was transferred to Mangaluru where his family lived, no one could call it harassment. Subbaiah insisted that he had other psychological issues bothering him.
He pointed out that an FIR could be filed after an investigation proved the element of abetment in a suicide under section no. 174. Instead of allowing a probe under section 174, the vested interests indulged in meaningless protests, thus harming the society and misleading the public.
Going a step further, Subbaih also said that he had not seen much grief on the face of the DySP’s wife in the wake of his suicide. Initially, Ganapathi’s father had given a statement that his son had done it out of depression. But thereafter he retracted the statement.
Subbaiah felt that the family members had become pawns in the political game played the opposition parties and followed their instructions and were thereby losing public respect.
He said further that demanding action against George and the two IPS officers also amounted to harassment, adding a bit of sarcasm that this too could lead to their suicides.
Speaking further, he said that DySPs Kallappa Handibag and Ganapthi both had links with the Sangh Parivar and the same was true in the case of Anupama Shenoy. Hence he put the total blame on the Sangh Parivar for the situations in which they had landed.
Opining that it was the RSS which had caused the deaths of Kuttappa – who was killed during the Tipu Jayanti observance in Madikeri – and Ganapathi, he cautioned the Kodavas by asking them to wake up before more deaths could occur.
He added that observance of bandh in the name of Ganapathi’s suicide and causing inconvenience to the public was an act against society.
Interestingly, Subbaiah was a leader of the BJP during its previous avatar as the Bharatiya Jan Sangh and was a strong propounder of the RSS ideology. But, later, by his own admission, when he came to know of the hidden agenda of organization, he walked out of it a couple of decades ago.
Soon thereafter, he wrote a book with details of what made him quit the RSS.