Yavatmal farmer's kin accept his body two days after suicide

The family members of debt-ridden Yavatmal farmer Shankar Chayare, who allegedly committed suicide on April 10, today accepted his body on an assurance that they will get appropriate compensation soon, a police official said.

The farmer was cremated in his village, Rajurwadi, this evening.

"The body of the farmer was handed over to his family members today," M Rajkumar, Superintendent of Police, Yavatmal, told PTI.

Earlier, Chayare's family members had refused to accept his body, even as the state government offered to pay Rs 8 lakh as compensation.

The body was kept in the morgue of state-run Vasantrao Naik medical college and hospital in Yavatmal for the last two days.

Earlier in the day, Amravati Revenue Commissioner Piyush Singh, District Collector Chandrakant Jajoo, Inspector General (Amravati Range) Chhagan Wakade and the SP persuaded the family members of Chayare, including his wife Alka and daughter Jayashree, to take possession of the body.

The SP said the deceased farmer's family members were told that the state government has agreed to compensate them appropriately in a swift manner.

"The meeting with Chayare's family members was held in presence of former BJP MP and current state vice-president of Congress Nana Patole, and Shetkari Nyaya Hakk Andolan Samiti convener Devanand Pawar," an official said.

After Chayare's family agreed to take possession of the corpse, it was taken to government hospital for postmortem and later handed over to them.

The SP told Chayare's kin that a Supervisor's job would be arranged for one of the daughters of the deceased in an MIDC-based textile mill in the area.

Chayare had allegedly killed himself by consuming a poisonous chemical, apparently upset due to crop-loss, according to the police.

The police had yesterday said Chayare's daughter had given them a purported suicide note of the deceased in which Prime Minister Narendra Modi has been held responsible for the farmer's extreme step.

Jayashree, the eldest daughter of the deceased, had filed a complaint against Modi in the Ghatanji Police Station.

The note, which the police insists was not recovered from the scene of the death, has been sent to handwriting experts for ascertaining its authenticity.

"In the two-page note, PM Modi's name was written on the second page. Some sentences in the note have been struck out and some letters in the note are not written in a uniform style. Therefore, we have sent this note to the forensic sciences department to the handwriting experts," Ganesh Bhavsar, in-charge of the Ghatanji police station, had told PTI.

The deceased farmer is survived by his wife Alka (47), daughters--Jayashree (21), Bhagyashree (19), and Dhanashree (15), and son Akash (15).

Meanwhile, Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis today didn't attend the scheduled inauguration of the newly-constructed administrative building of the Yavatmal Urban Co-Operative Bank Ltd.

Yavatmal district Guardian Minister Madan Yerawar said Fadnavis had sent a message to bank chairman Ajay Mundada expressing regret over his inability to attend the event "due to unavoidable engagements in Mumbai".

However, the chief minister visited Umarkhed tehsil in the district via Nanded this afternoon.

As per the earlier schedule, he was supposed to travel to Umarkhed after attending the Yavatmal event.

Meanwhile, Rajkumar said, "There was no untoward incident either in Yavatmal or in Umarkhed. Everything went off peacefully".