A cab driver working on contract with the Chikkaballapur zilla panchayat office allegedly died by suicide, blaming BJP MP K Sudhakar and two others in a four-page death note.
The deceased has been identified as N Babu, 31, a resident of Chikkaballapur. His body was found at the zilla panchayat office on Thursday morning.
Besides BJP MP Sudhakar, the police said, Babu has blamed zilla panchayat second division assistant Manjunath and one Nagesh in the suicide note, which was found in the deceased’s car.
A police officer said, as per the note, Nagesh had collected Rs 40 lakh from Babu by promising him a government job with the help of Sudhakar in 2021, when the BJP leader was the health and medical education minister of Karnataka. Babu had taken a loan of Rs 25 lakh to pay Nagesh, but the latter did not return the money even after repeated requests.
He added that Babu had sent the death note on WhatsApp to a zilla panchayat office employee on Wednesday evening, but the latter did not take it seriously.
BJP MP Sudhakar has claimed that he never met Babu. “I don’t know who Babu and Manjunath are. Nagesh’s relative Krishnamurthy is in our party and I know him. It is a political conspiracy to drag my name into this case. I have nothing to do with it,” said Sudhakar.
Kushal Chousky, Superintendent of Police, Chikkaballapur, said, “Babu has been working as a driver for 7-8 years. He worked as a driver to the chief account officer of the Chikkaballapur ZP. He left home on Wednesday, stating that he needed to go to the zilla panchayat office as the account officer had a meeting there. He parked his car and died by suicide. He has named some people; we are verifying all the details.”
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Meanwhile, following the death, both BJP and Congress workers arrived at the local Chikkaballapur rural police station in a show of strength on Thursday.