Patna,(BiharTimes): The Officer on Special Duty (OSD) to the district magistrate of Buxar, Tauqeer Akram, 46, who is a deputy collector rank officer, committed suicide. His body was found hanging from a ceiling fan at his rented house in the district headquarters town on Sunday morning.
According to the superintendent of police of Bhojpur, Avkash Kumar, who is holding additional charge as Buxar SP, a suicide note was found in the Bihar administrative service officer's room, which reads: “No one is to be held responsible. It’s my own wish to meet death.”
His father Haq Nawaz Shakeel, 70, and mother Najma Shakeel, 65, were sleeping in another room while his wife had gone to her parents’ place in Saran district four days ago.
It needs to be recalled that on August 11 2017 Buxar district magistrate, Mukesh Pandey, a young IAS officer, committed suicide in Delhi NCR. His body was found near a railway track near Ghaziabad.
According to reports quoting an eye-witness a Union minister had publicly scolded Akram at a meeting at Buxar circuit house on November 2. The meeting was held to assess preparations for the ‘Ganga Aarti’ as part of the Dev Deepavali festival
The eye-witness has been quoted in The Telegraph as saying that Akram had suggested the Aarti be held in one ghat but the minister, who wanted it to be held in all ghats, had rebuked the OSD, who had left the meeting silently.
Union minister of state for health and family welfare Ashwini Choubey, who is the local MP, visited Akram’s family on Sunday and said a probe should ascertain why the official, who was fine till 11 PMon Saturday developed suicidal tendency suddenly.
Choubey later on Sunday evening slipped and fractured his ankle when he was attending an event organised by televangelist Morari Bapu in a temple in Buxar.
The doctor has plastered his ankle and asked him to rest for 15 days.
Sources said Akram had returned on Saturday night from Patna, where he had gone to enquire about a recent high court order that quashed a land acquisition tribunal’s order deducting half of his salary.
The district magistrate of Buxar Arvind Kumar Verma said that he had been getting half salary for last nine months as a punishment.
Chief minister Nitish Kumar condoled the death of Akram and asked the chief secretary Anjani Kumar Singh to probe the matter.
Meanwhile, RJD chief Lalu Prasad directly held the state government responsible for the suicide and asked the chief minister to explain the whole sequence of events which led to this incident.
It needs to be recalled that when Buxar DM committed suicide three months back it was said that he did so due to family tension.
