Gulf returnee’s suicide: Human Rights Commission orders probe

Kollam: the Kerala State Human Rights Commission has ordered a probe into the suicide of Sugathan, 65, a Gulf returnee, in Punalur in the district.

Commission member K Mohan Kumar has instructed Kollam rural SP, and the district collector to conduct a comprehensive probe and submit a report within three weeks.

Sugathan of Aikkarakonam, Punalur, had hanged himself following the alleged mental torture inflicted on him by the CPI-AIYF activists.

The Pathanapuram police had booked a local AIYF leader for aiding in the suicide.

Sugathan, who was an automobile mechanic in Muscat, had taken a property on lease at Elambal to start a workshop. He had also constructed a shed on the property spending nearly Rs 3 lakh. But the local leaders of the AIYF, youth wing of the CPI, disrupted the construction which for-ced Sugathan to commit suicide by hanging himself in the temporary workshop he had constructed.

Earlier, the case was taken for unnatural death but was later on changed to abetment to suicide as protests spread.