Bengaluru:

The father of Bengaluru techie Atul Subhash who died by suicide, said his son had been “broken from inside” after multiple cases were filed against him and his family by his wife.

Atul Subhash, the 34-year-old deputy general manager of a private firm, died by suicide on Monday in his Bengaluru apartment, leaving behind a 24-page suicide note, accusing his wife and her relatives of harassment. In his suicide note, he also alleged that a judge had demanded Rs 5 lakh to “settle” the case.

“My son used to say that there is a lot of corruption but he will fight as he is on the path of truth…He was broken from inside, though he didn’t tell anyone anything,” Subhash’s father Pawan Kumar told ANI.

Mr Kumar, who currently stays in Bihar’s Samastipur, said Subhash’s wife started filing cases against them in January 2021.

“She started filing cases since January 2021…My son had thought that she had left (their home) after Corona and that their 1-year-old son would grow up a little at his maternal uncle’s home… she also started filing cases against our entire family,” the father said.

Earlier, a four-member team of Bengaluru Police, including one woman police personnel reached Kotwali in Jaunpur in Uttar Pradesh. Jaunpur is the residence of Subhash’s in-laws.

The father has alleged that the judge overseeing the case also asked for Rs 5 lakhs to “settle the case”.

“When they went ahead for mediation, it began from Rs 20,000 and then escalated to Rs 40,000; then the judge said that if he (the deceased) wants a settlement, he should give Rs 5 Lakh,” the father said.

Meanwhile, the brother of the deceased, Vikas, said his family had “no idea” that the Bengaluru techie would take such a drastic step.

“We talked to him normally. We had no idea he had decided to take such a step. We had never felt he was going to take such a step. I am in touch with a few of his friends and even they didn’t have any idea of his thoughts,” the brother said.

The brother also alleged that there had been “false cases” filed on him and his family too, saying that his brother had been mentally tortured.

“False cases have been filed on me, and my parents, just like they were filed on my brother. Action should be taken against all those who mentally tortured my brother and filed false cases against him,” the brother said.

He further claimed that Atul Subhash also wrote to various leaders and institutes, including the President and the Supreme Court, explaining his situation in detail.

“If those emails have reached them, we hope action is taken and some laws, forums, or committees are made where men can go to seek justice… Laws and provisions made to empower women are today being misused,” the brother added.

Earlier on December 11, the SC also expressed concern over the growing tendency to misuse Section 498A of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), which penalises cruelty by husbands and their relatives against married women.

While quashing a Section 498A IPC case against a husband and his parents in a different case, a bench of Justices BV Nagarathna and N Kotiswar Singh said that the Section became a tool for unleashing personal vendetta against the husband and his family by a wife.

Atul Subhash died by suicide in the early hours of December 9 after alleging harassment from his wife and her family.

Subhash wrote “Justice is due” on every page of a 24-page note. He also alleged in his suicide note that his wife had filed nine cases against him under various sections, including murder, sexual misconduct, harassment for money, domestic violence, and dowry.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Amid the outcry over Bengaluru techie Atul Subhash’s death by suicide over alleged harassment by his wife, Nikita Singhania, details have emerged of a complaint filed by her in 2022, alleging harassment and assault for dowry. Ms Singhania has alleged that he treated the husband-wife relationship “like a beast” and his family’s demand for dowry contributed to her father suffering a stroke and dying. 

In his 24-page suicide note, however, Subhash has replied to nearly every allegation made in the complaint.

Ms Singhania filed the complaint in Uttar Pradesh’s Jaunpur – where her family lives – in April 2022 claiming she was harassed and assaulted for dowry. Subhash, his brother and their parents were named as accused. 

Apart from the Dowry Prohibition Act, 1961, the complaint also had charges like cruelty by husband or relatives, assault, and criminal intimidation under the Indian Penal Code.

According to news agency PTI, Nikita said she got married to Subhash on April 26, 2019, and her husband and in-laws were dissatisfied with what her parents gave them during the wedding and demanded Rs 10 lakh more.

“(They) started torturing me physically and mentally for dowry. When I told my parents about the harassment and dowry, my parents explained to me that everything will be fine, listen and keep living with it. But no improvement of any kind came in my husband and in-laws,” she said in the complaint, according to the PTI report. 

“My husband started to beat me up after drinking alcohol and started treating the husband-wife relationship with me like a beast. He used to transfer my entire salary from my account to his account by threatening me,” she added.

In his suicide note, however, Subhash states that, according to Ms Singhania, he earned Rs 40 lakh a year as an Artificial Intelligence professional when she left the house in 2021 and Rs 80 lakh after that. He said her claim of his family asking for Rs 10 lakh was “laughable”.

“We demanded Rs 10 lakh dowry is the most laughable allegation. My wife has claimed that I had a CTC of Rs 40 lakhs when she left the house. My wife also claimed that I have a CTC of Rs 80 Lakhs later in the case. Why would a man making Rs 40 or 80 lakhs would ever demand Rs 10 lakhs and leave his wife and child (sic),” he wrote.

On the allegation of him beating his wife, the techie said she had never produced any evidence of this.

“I used to beat her up black and blue after getting drunk. A well built man like me, if decides to beat someone black and blue (sic), would leave a person with broken bones, bleeding and at least some marks. Why did she not produce any photo of it or anyone who is a witness ( we often had a house maid, cook etc),” he wrote in the note.

Father’s Death

In her complaint, Ms Singhania also claimed that, irritated by the words of her in-laws and because of their demand for dowry, her father’s health deteriorated suddenly and he suffered a stroke on August 17, 2019. She said he died during treatment. 

In his suicide note, Subhash called this a “poor Bollywood plot” and claimed her father had been undergoing treatment for diabetes and heart disease for 10 years. He said doctors had given Ms Singhania’s father a few months to live.

“Me and my family murdered her father by asking for dowry of Rs 10 lakhs and her father got a heart attack. This is some poor bollywood plot. She has already confessed that her father was suffering from long-term illness in her cross examination. Her father was getting treated from AlIMS for the last 10 years for heart disease, dlabetes etc. Doctors gave him a few months and hence we got married quickly after just a few months after getting connected (sic),” he wrote.

Nikita Singhani, her mother Nisha Singhania, brother Anurag Singhania and uncle Sushil Singhania have been charged with abetment of suicide after Atul Subhash died by suicide in his house in Bengaluru on Monday. 

In his note, Subhash had said he was dying by suicide because his wife and her relatives had filed a slew of false cases against him and his family and were trying to get him to pay Rs 2 lakh a month as maintenance for her and the couple’s four-year-old son.

“The more I work hard and become better at my work, the more l and my family will be harassed and extorted and the whole legal system will encourage and help my harassers… Now, with me gone, there won’t be any money and there won’t be any reason to harass my old parents and my brother. I may have destroyed my body but it has saved everything I believe in,” he wrote.

Bengaluru:

The family of Bengaluru techie Atul Subhash, who died by suicide after alleging harassment by his estranged wife in videos and posts, has filed a police complaint against his wife, her family members, and a judge.

Bikas Kumar, the brother of the 34-year-old, has filed an FIR (First Information Report) in Bengaluru for abetment of suicide against his wife Nikita Singhania, her mother Nisha Singhania, her brother Anurag Singhania and her uncle Sushil Singhania.

Atul Subhash, who was from Uttar Pradesh but lived in Bengaluru and worked for a private firm, left a 24-page note detailing what he alleged was years of emotional distress because of harassment and multiple cases filed by his wife and her family, and a judge in Uttar Pradesh.

As details emerge of Atul Subhash’s note and videos, the family is in shock and has vowed to seek justice.

“My brother did everything for her. Whatever has happened was unfortunate. If he had ever discussed it with me or our father – we would have helped him get out of this situation…,” Bikas Kumar told reporters.

“I want to request the government of India and the President – that justice must be done to my brother if he is with truth otherwise give me the proof to show that he is wrong. There should be a proper investigation against the judge who is named in my brother’s suicide,” he said.

Bikas said even in his suicide notes, Atul Subhash wrote—‘ If I win from the system, devote my mortal remains in Ganga otherwise in a gutter outside the court.”

The FIR says Atul Subhash married Nikita Singhania in 2019 and they had a child together. The complaint alleges that after their divorce, Nikita Singhania and her family filed a false case against Atul Subhash and insisted on Rs 3 crore to settle the case.

The Bengaluru police received a call at 6:00 am on Monday about a suicide in a flat. The police found the flat bolted from inside. They broke in to find Atul Subhash hanging.

The police also found the 24-page note in which Atul Subhash wrote “Justice is Due” on every single page. Along with his wife and her family, Subhash also accused a family court judge in Uttar Pradesh’s Jaunpur of not hearing him out, and an officer of the court of taking bribes in front of the judge. Atul claimed his wife had filed nine cases against him, including murder, sexual misconduct, harassment for money, domestic violence, and dowry.

Atul Subhash described the instances that he said drove him to his death. He recorded a video describing his alleged harassment and asking his family members not to immerse his ashes until he got justice. He also had a message for his four-year-old son, who he claimed had been kept away from him. The note also called for his parents to be given custody of his child.

Bengaluru:

The 34-year-old techie who died by suicide at his home in Bengaluru had been planning his death for months and had prepared a detailed checklist of everything he needed to do in the days leading up to it, ticking off every task once it was done. A printout of the checklist was pasted on the wall of his Bengaluru home, right next to another printed paper with the words ‘Justice is due’. 

Atul Subhash, who hanged himself on Monday, left behind a 24-page suicide note and recorded a nearly 90-minute long video in which he alleges that his wife and her relatives had filed a slew of false cases against him and his family and were trying to get him to pay Rs 2 lakh a month as maintenance for her and the couple’s four-year-old son. Subhash, who is originally from Bihar, also levelled allegations against a judge in Uttar Pradesh’s Jaunpur, where his in-laws live and some of his cases were being heard, claiming that she had demanded Rs 5 lakh from him to settle them. He also wrote a letter to the President, criticising the criminal justice system and highlighting a rising trend of false cases being filed against men by their estranged wives. 

The checklist prepared by Subhash was divided into three parts – ‘Before last day’, ‘Last day’ and ‘Execute last moment’ – and included items like removing his phone fingerprint and face recognition, presumably so that it could be accessed by others after he was dead; leaving his car, bike and room keys on the fridge; and completing all his office work and submitting his office laptop and charger.

While the list has a column for ticking off the tasks in the ‘Last day’ and ‘Execute last moment’ sections, it has ‘Done’ printed against the items in the ‘Before last day’ section, indicating that these had already been completed before the list was printed out. These included securing his finances, finishing office tasks and legal preparations, compiling all communications, and backing up data and “creating redundancies”.

In the ‘Last day’ section, the techie, who works in Artificial Intelligence according to his suicide note, had another task related to creating a local data backup as a redundancy. The other items included removing the fingerprint from his phone, uploading his scanned suicide note, clearing all payments, uploading his video suicide note and submitting his laptop, charger and ID card at his office. 

On the top of the list on his ‘Execute Last Moment’ section was having a bath, followed by keeping his car, bike and room keys on the fridge and the suicide note on the table. The focus on the car keys was also evident from the police complaint filed by Subhash’s brother, Bikas Kumar, who said the techie had sent him several messages saying goodbye and sharing the Google Maps location of his car. The other items on the list included sending messages to his lawyers and family and sending mails to the High Court and Supreme Court – after checking attachments – in which he had complained about the judge assigned to his case, who allegedly took bribes. 

‘Took Months’

The fact that this list was carefully planned was also reflected in Subhash’s suicide note, in which he mentions that it took him months to ensure that all his “pending responsibilities” were completed. 

“It took me a few months to make sure that I complete my pending responsibilities I had towards my family and finish my work commitments etc. Also a lot of government office work is slow, that also led to this delay in suicide. I hope this delay will not go against me and will not help harassers and extorters of me and my family,” the techie wrote.  

“The more | work hard and become better at my work, the more l and my family will be harassed and extorted and the whole legal system will encourage and help my harassers… Now, with me gone, there won’t be any money and there won’t be any reason to harass my old parents and my brother. I may have destroyed my body but it has saved everything I believe in,” he said in another part of the note. 

Instigation?

In his suicide note, Subhash said his wife and her family’s cases against him included one under the Dowry Prohibition Act and others pertaining to sections like cruelty against a woman. He said when he had pointed out to the judge at one point that men are dying by suicide because of false cases, his wife had asked him why he wasn’t doing so. He claimed the judge had also laughed at this while ordering his wife to leave the room and then his mother-in-law had asked why he had not died by suicide yet. 

Subhash said when he had asked his mother-in-law how she and her daughter would get money when he was gone, she said she would get it from his parents and ensure that his family kept doing the rounds of courts for life. 

“It seems that Devi Saraswati herself made my mother in law disclose her plans and the solution of all the problems too. This incident along with instigation to commit suicide from my wife and the face of the laughing judge mocking my helplessness has rendered my faith in legal system destroyed and has prompted my action of committing suicide (sic),” he wrote.

The police have registered an abutment of suicide case against Subhash’s wife and some members of his family, according to news agency PTI.