A freelance journalist who was involved in the broadcast of rape allegations last week against a Navi Mumbai police constable, which led to the lawman's arrest, tried to commit suicide on Wednesday alleging mental harrassment by the police.
Pawan Bhargav was the source of a Sahara Samay story that constable Hamid Kazi raped a 19-year-old former bar woman twice and threatened to "deport" her to Bangladesh if she did not pay him Rs 3,000. A mobile phone conversation with the bar woman was broadcast on the television channel on October 19 that led to Kazi’s arrest.
The woman, however, filed an affidavit in a magistrate court two days later retracting her statement. She declared that her husband and the television reporter had pressured her into making the allegation against the constable.
Bhargav, who checked into a hotel opposite Thane station on Tuesday night, was found lying on the floor in "an abnormal condition" when the door was forcibly opened on Wednesday morning after the hotel staff failed to get a reply from Bhargav’s room. A bottle of insecticide was found in the bathroom. Bhargav, who was rushed to a nearby hospital, is reported to be out of danger now.
Bhargav, in a handwritten suicide note addressed to the Maharashtra home minister RR Patil, accused two Navi Mumbai police officials and two television reporters of driving him to suicide. Bhargav had been questioned by the police about the "sting operation". Navi Mumbai police commissioner Vijay Kamble and the Thane police refused to comment on the incident.
The "victim" alleged on Tuesday that she had lied earlier because she was under pressure from her estranged husband Aminul Gazi, supposedly a Bangladeshi, and a Sahara Samay reporter who planned the "sting operation". Women's activists, however, have accused the police of armtwisting the woman into changing her statement.
Bhargav led the Sahara reporter to former bar dancer. Bhargav, now unemployed, hailed from Delhi and had been in Mumbai for a year-and-half. He was earlier employed with Jain TV in Mumbai.
"I have been informed that the source who gave information about the woman has attempted suicide stating that he was under some sort of pressure. It is for the police to investigate the matter," RK Bajaj, vice-president of Sahara Samay, told the Indian Express.
"There was no sting operation involved. A sting is when one tries to trap anybody or attempt to lure anyone. We had information from the source, which was later confirmed by the woman, that the constable would come to the place and rape her. We just had the cameras in position at the location," Bajaj said.
"He was a trainee in our organisation for a few months. He was a stringer for the Navi Mumbai area. He was told to stop reporting for us one-and-a-half months ago for reasons that I do not want to reveal," Amin Pawar, Jain TV’s Mumbai bureau chief, said.
The Navi Mumbai police have been engaged in Operation Flushout, a drive against illegal migranmts from Bangladesh.
