Engg’s death: It’s suicide, says CBI
Nearly two and half months after PWD executive engineer Yogendra Pandey died under mysterious circumstances in Bihar, an inquiry by the Central Bureau of Investigation has established that the officer had committed suicide. Manish Tiwari reports.
Nearly two and half months after PWD executive engineer Yogendra Pandey died under mysterious circumstances in Bihar, an inquiry by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has established that the officer had committed suicide.
After his death, over 16,000 engineers had stopped work, forcing the Nitish Kumar government to order a CBI inquiry.
Pandey was then posted in the road construction department at Sitamarhi, On June 18, his body was found outside the Sitamarhi Collector’s Office, just two weeks after he had requested the local police to provide him security.
While the Bihar police had termed the death a suicide, the forensic sciences and autopsy reports had suggested murder of the engineer.
The inquiry revealed it was a case of suicide and there was no foul play, CBI sources said. The agency has decided to file a closure report in the case within a month, they added.
CBI spokesman Harsh Bhal, when contacted, said: “Since the matter is still under investigation, I would not like to comment on it.”
Though the first postmortem report showed that it was a case of suicide, Pandey’s brother Sanjay Pandey had cried foul, saying it was a case of murder. His family claimed that a few days before his death, Pandey was assaulted by a local contractor whom he refused a cash advance against rules.
Subsequently, the state government had ordered a second post-mortem examination following a demand by the Bihar Engineers’ Association.
The second report said Pandey was hit on the head with hard object before he fell to death.