A woman allegedly suffering from mental health issues died by suicide by hanging herself from a police communication tower in Chhattisgarh’s Jashpur district on Tuesday morning, even as policemen and onlookers tried to dissuade her, officials said.
The incident occurred in front of Konkori Police Station, they said, adding that according to the woman’s family, she had also earlier tried to end her life and had been watching suicide-related videos for the past few days.
Before climbing the tower, the 22-year-old woman called 112, the state police’s emergency response service.
On receiving information, a police team reached the spot, following which the Home Guard, District Disaster Response Force and local Nagar Panchayat personnel reached there, officials said.
Police officers and others tried to advise her and bring her down, but she nevertheless hanged herself using her hijab, they said, without explaining the reason for this extreme step.
“The body has been lowered from the tower and sent for post-mortem,” Jashpur Additional Superintendent of Police Rakesh Patanwar said.
The official said that preliminary information indicates that the woman, a resident of Domadand village in the same area, was suffering from mental illness and had attempted suicide earlier.
He added: “Her mother told the police that she had been watching videos on how to commit suicide over the phone for the past few days.”
He added that the police are interrogating her family members to gather more details, and further investigations are underway.
The mother of the deceased told reporters that her daughter left home on Monday while she was talking on the phone and later informed the family that she was in Konkuri, located 6 km from Domadand, but did not return.
She said: “This morning we received information about the incident. She was mentally ill. She was watching videos on her phone about suicide by hanging.”
The police prevented people gathered at the scene from filming videos and recordings of the incident.
Discussing suicides can be triggering for some. However, suicides can be prevented. Some of the major helpline numbers for suicide prevention in India are 011-23389090 from Soumyatri (Delhi based) and 044-24640050 from Sneha Foundation (Chennai based).
