Bengaluru, July 5 (IANS) A Karnataka Police officer, posted as a deputy superintendent of police in Chikkamagaluru, committed suicide on Tuesday at Belagavi, a day after a departmental inquiry was ordered against him in a kidnap-cum-ransom case, police said.
"DSP Kallappa Handibagh, 34, hanged himself in his in-laws house at Belagavi and was declared dead by doctors when he was taken to KLE hospital in the town," Belagavi Superintendent of Police B.R. Ravikanthe Gowda told reporters in the town, about 500km from Bengaluru.
A case of unnatural death was registered after Handibagh's father-in-law Chandrappa filed a complaint in a Belagavi police station that his son-in-law was forced to take the extreme step by Chikkamagaluru Superintendent of Police K. Santosh Babu who ill-treated him professionally and personally over the months.
"We want an inquiry against Babu for ill-treating, humiliating and filing a false kidnap-cum-ransom case against my son-in-law which drove him to death," Chandrappa said in the complaint.
Handibagh drove to Belagavi on Monday night after a criminal case was filed against him for allegedly conspiring to abduct and collect Rs 10 lakh ransom from financier H.M. Thejas, 37, a resident of Kempanahalli.
Thejas filed the abduction case at Basavanahalli rural police station in Chikkamgaluru district, naming Handibagh as part of the kidnapping gang.
Director General of Police Om Prakash on Monday ordered a CID inquiry into Handibagh's role in the kidnap-cum-ransom case on a report Babu sent to him.
"I was kidnapped on June 28 from my house at Kempanahalli and driven to Bengaluru in a Scorpio by a gang whose leader was identified as Abhijith. I was held captive in an old warehouse and tortured. Unable to bear anymore, I agreed to pay Rs 10 lakh to escape from the gang," Thejas said in his complaint.
After mobilising the money, Thejas asked the gang to whom and where the ransom had to be delivered. The gang gave Handibagh's mobile number to find out where Thejas's friend Shivu should handover the ransom amount.
"The victim's friend had recorded the mobile conversation between Handibag and Shivu while handing over the ransom amount to the former," the report said.
