Techie who looked up ways to commit suicide found dead in car

BENGALURU: Police on Friday afternoon recovered a software engineer’s partially burnt body from his car, which was parked at an isolated place in Sathanur Hosahalli village, on the outskirts of Bengaluru. Karthik Shetty, 30, was a resident of Fraser Town and employed with a private tech firm in the city. He is survived by his wife and a six-month-old son.
At 11.30am on Friday, Karthik’s mother Shubha Shetty filed a missing complaint with Pulakeshinagar police, in which she said Karthik had left home on Thursday noon, but hadn’t returned. Police say, as per preliminary probe, Karthik killed himself. According to them, he poured petrol over his body, rolled up the windows and set himself on fire.
“We verified the search history on his mobile phone and found that on Thursday evening he had looked up ways to commit suicide inside a car. We suspect he might have taken the extreme step at night,” police said, adding that he might have suffocated to death, considering he had suffered minor burn injuries.
Hours after they registered Shubha’s complaint, cops learnt about Karthik’s car from a villager who called Chikkajala police at about 2pm. Chikkajala police rushed to the spot and later called the jurisdictional police.
Trigger not known
“Bagaluru police have registered a case of suicide based on the findings of the preliminary probe and the complaint filed by his family members. We are not aware of the reason behind Karthik’s suicide; probe is on,” said Kala Krishnaswamy, deputy commissioner of police (northeast).
Quoting forensic experts, who examined the crime scene, police said the fire failed to spread due to lack of oxygen. “A portion of the steering wheel, the driver’s seat and Karthik’s clothes were burnt. We have shifted the body to a hospital for postmortem, which, along with the detailed forensic report, will throw more light on the case,” a police officer said.