In a heart-rending incident, three members of an impoverished family — a middle-aged woman and her two daughters, both in their late 20s — allegedly committed suicide by consuming a toxic chemical used for polishing gold ornaments at their rented house in Gandhi Chowk here late on Wednesday night.
The tragic incident shook the neighbours and relatives of the deceased, leaving the head of the poor family G Prakash, 58, a worker of a gilt polishing shop, in untold misery. The deceased were identified as Govindamma, 48, and her daughters Radhika, 29, and Ramya, 27.
The trio allegedly entered into a suicide pact unable to come to terms with the acute financial problems and ended their lives by consuming the highly toxic chemical substance late on Wednesday night. Prakash, who returned home from work late in the night, knocked on the door several times but did not get any response. He grew suspicious and alerted the police, who in turn broke open the main door and found the trio lying dead on the floor in the second room.
Sources said that the COVID-19 pandemic-induced crisis exacerbated the financial problems of the poor goldsmith’s family leaving them in penury. Radhika, a graduate, and Ramya, who discontinued her studies after SSC, had taken up tailoring to surmount the financial difficulties but in vain, sources added.
Radhika’s marriage was fixed with a youth from the erstwhile undivided Warangal district in January next year. However, Govindamma was terribly upset over the hand-to-mouth existence of her family and her inability to afford the minimum expenses for her elder daughter’s wedding slated to be held in less than a month.
The town-based social worker Annam Srinivas Rao shifted the bodies of the trio to the mortuary at the District Headquarters Hospital in the Annam Seva Foundation’s ambulance and counselled a devastated Prakash. Some relatives of the deceased on Thursday came forward to perform the last rites of the trio as per the customs even as the grief-stricken Prakash remained penniless, sources said.
(Roshini - Suicide Prevention Helpline: 040 66202000)
