CBI will probe Karnataka whistleblower officer's death
Bengaluru, March 23 (IANS) The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) would probe the "unnatural" death of Karnataka IAS officer D.K. Ravi here on March 16, state Chief Minister Siddaramaiah announced here on Monday.
After rejecting the demand by the opposition parties, an outraged public and Ravi's bereaved family since March 17, Siddaramaiah told lawmakers in the legislative assembly that he was referring the case to the CBI in deference to the feelings of Ravi's parents, who are shattered by his mysterious passing away.
"I understand the feelings of Ravi's parents (Gowramma and Kariyappa) and respect public sentiments. As wished by them, the CBI will probe the reason(s) for their son's tragic death," Siddaramaiah said amid commotion in the lower house, as the opposition BJP and Janata Dal-Secular (JD-S) members jeered at him.
Ravi, 36, was found dead -- hanging from a ceiling fan in his bedroom -- in his apartment in the city's upscale southeast suburb by his wife Kusuma on that fateful day after he did not attend to her calls since noon.
City police commissioner M.N. Reddi had termed Ravi's death prime facie a case of suicide on the basis of evidence gathered during the preliminary investigation.
The state government on March 17 ordered an inquiry by the state's Criminal Investigation Department (CID) under Section 174 of the IPC (Indian Penal Code), pertaining to suicide and not Section 302 of the IPC, which deals with murder.
The 2009 batch officer was the city-based additional commissioner in the state's commercial tax department since December 2014 after he was transferred out as deputy commissioner of Kolar district, about 100 km from here, where he built a reputation of being an upright officer for reining in the sand and land mafias.
The decision to transfer probe into his death to the CBI came three days after ruling Congress president Sonia Gandhi on March 20 advised Siddaramaiah to that effect. Vociferous demand for the CBI probe by the BJP and JD-S in both the houses had rendered the budget session of the state legislature paralysed since March 17.
Asserting that his government did not want to hush up the case or intend to shield anyone, a defiant chief minister said the CBI would also probe the "foul play" charge levelled by the parents in the mysterious death of their son.
"No politics should be played in matters of death. We don't believe in it. The opposition should also not do it," Siddaramaiah said.
The Karnataka High Court on Sunday evening put on hold the release or making public the CID's interim report into Ravi's death. This prevented the chief minister from tabling it in the assembly before handing over the case to the CBI.
The high court granted the freeze on the interim report on a writ petition by Sudhir Reddy, husband of woman IAS officer Rohini Sindhoori Dasari, whom Ravi had called many times and texted messages several times to her mobile an hour before he hanged himself on that fateful day last week.
Ravi and Rohini, who is the chief executive officer (CEO) of Mandya Zilla Parishad (local body), about 100 km from Bengaluru, were batchmates of the high-profile Indian Administrative Service cadre 2009 batch.
JD-S floor leader and former state chief minister H.D. Kumaraswamy had accused the chief minister and police of selectively leaking to the local media that Ravi committed suicide because Rohini had spurned his love and refused to marry him by divorcing her husband (Reddy) as they already have a child and were well settled.
"Disclosure of select evidences from the preliminary investigation to the media is an attempt by the state government to divert the people's attention from the mysterious death of an IAS officer (Ravi) who had taken on the high and mighty, including tax evaders and real estate barons by raiding their properties in the city recently," Kumaraswamy told reporters here on March 20.
Recalling that the BJP never ordered a CBI inquiry into many criminal and illegal mining cases during its five-year tenure (from 2008-2013), Siddaramaiah said it had no moral right to seek such a probe after terming the national probe agency as "Chor Bachao Institution" and "Congress Bachao Institution".
"We believe in our police system. I never said anything against the CBI, which is an independent agency as our CID in the state. I wanted to table the interim CID report but not able to do so because of the high court order," he observed.
The BJP members, however, staged a walkout after Speaker Kagodu Thimappa refused to expunge the chief minister's remarks against them from the house proceedings.