By IANS,
Lucknow : An Uttar Pradesh government official committed suicide after his seniors allegedly harassed him by demanding money. Three officials have been suspended over the incident.
Gayas Ahmed, a 28-year-old posted as a marketing officer of the Pradesh Cooperative Federation (PCF) in Mahoba district, hanged himself Friday night in his house in Allahabad, some 200 km from here.
“The managing director (MD), additional managing director (AMD) and general manager of the PCF have been suspended,” a government spokesperson said late Saturday.
Ahmed left a suicide note blaming his seniors for continuously demanding bribes.
“Since I joined I was continuously being harassed by the MD, AMD and the GM for money and they also used to threaten they would spoil my Character Role. I had even given Rs.48,000 as a bribe to these officials and this money was arranged by my colleagues who collected donations in the office,” Ahmed wrote in his suicide note.
“In the past few days, I was getting calls from the head office demanding Rs.100,000. Failing to arrange this, I am forced to commit suicide,” the note read.
The Samajwadi Party, which distributed copies of the suicide note Saturday, blamed the Bahujan Samaj Paryt (BSP)-led state government for extorting money from government officials ahead of the Lok Sabha elections.
“Ahmed joined the PCF in 2006 when we were in power and he has become a victim of this extortionist government. Like PWD engineer Manoj gupta of Auraiya, who was killed by a BSP legislator when he refused to shell out money for the chief minister’s birthday celebrations, Ahmed was also under pressure to give money to enable the BSP candidate contest elections,” Samajwadi Pary leader Shivpal Singh Yadav said here.
Cooperatives Minister Swami Prasad Maurya, who is contesting the polls from the Devariya seat, was unavailable for comment.
Ahmed’s family has, meanwhile, submitted a complaint against the accused officials at Allahabad’s Kareli police station.
“We have received their complaint and we are in the process of registering an FIR under Section 306 (abetment to suicide),” Deputy Inspector General B.P. Tripathi told reporters.