Nikhil Bhardwaj

Tribune News Service

Ludhiana, July 10

After a woman committed suicide by consuming some sedatives at her house in Chawni Mohalla, a case of abetment to suicide has been registered against 12 persons, including a serving inspector of the Ludhiana police, his father and his two brothers.

Cop courted controversies earlier too

• In 2019, when Bittan Kumar was SHO at the Dugri police station, his brother Sajan was booked on snatching and extortion charges. Bittan was then transferred by the CP to prevent his influence on the probe against his brother.
• In August 2020, the inspector and his brother had a scuffle near their house in which the police registered a case of attempt to murder against the opposite party but the cop and his brother were not booked. Almost three months later, on the intervention of the Punjab and Haryana High Court, a cross case was registered against Bittan and Sajan.

The victim had alleged that her property was being usurped by the police personnel, Inspector Bittan Kumar (presently posted at Police Lines), and his aides, including his father Surinder Atwal, brothers Sajan Atwal and Pawan Atwal, Jaspal Singh, Gurcharan Singh, Ravinder Singh, Pradeep Kumar, Kuljinder Kaur, Manjit Kaur, Ravinder Kaur and Balbir Singh Makkar. Surinder Atwal is a BJP councillor while Sajan is a member of the party.

The woman had consumed sedatives on July 2, following which she was rushed to the DMC Hospital, where she succumbed on July 8. The police were not able to record her statement as her condition remained critical throughout the treatment. It was only after she succumbed that the police registered the case on July 10 on the basis of her suicide note.

Navdeep Sethi, the brother of the deceased, said “The accused forced my sister to sign the documents on the pretext of transferring the property in her name but recently they had started harassing her to vacate the property, which forced her to end her life”.