By Quaid NajmiMumbai, Feb 22 : In an apparent case of suicide, Mohan S.Delkar, the Independent MP from the Union Territory of Dadra & Nagar Haveli, was found hanging in a Mumbai hotel room on Monday morning, shocking political circles.
Police prima facie suspect tribal farmer and Bharatiya Navshakti Party leader Delkar, 58, committed suicide as a detailed suicide note running into several pages, has been recovered from the scene, said an official.
The body of Delkar, who is believed to have reached Mumbai on Sunday night by road, was found by his driver this afternoon when he attempted to enter his room but failed, and then informed the hotel staff.
Police have registered an accidental death report and investigating how and why he arrived in Mumbai, checked into the Hotel Sea Green, an Arabian Sea-facing hotel on Marine Drive where his body was recovered this afternoon, who had gone to meet or may have interacted with him, and the motives behind the stunning suicide and other details.
“The Marine Drive Police team is at the spot.A suicide note has also been recovered Investigation is being carried out.Prima facie, it’s a case of hanging, but the exact cause of death will be known only after the post-mortem is conducted,” Mumbai Police’s spokesperson, Deputy Commissioner of Police S.Chaitanya told IANS.
The suicide note, reportedly penned in Gujarati, is believed to contain certain clues behind Delkar resorting to the extreme measure, police sources said.
In his last speech in the Lok Sabha, the MP had accused the UT officialdom of harassment, insults, deprived him of addressing the people of his constituency, attempts made to book him in fake cases, etc, during the Covid-19 pandemic, which blocked his efforts to arrange the necessary aid to his constituents.
His body has been sent to Sir J.J.Hospital for the autopsy after which it is likely to be sent to his home in Silvassa, the capital of the UT.
Top police brass including Joint Commissioner of Police Vishwas Nangre-Patil, Additional Commissioner of Police S.Chaudhary and others rushed to the spot to direct and supervise the probe.
Popular as ‘Mohanbhai’ among his constituents, Delkar was a senior parliamentarian who represented the Union Territory of Dadra & Nagar Haveli, adjoining Maharashtra-Gujarat, for 7 times between 1989 and 2009 and again since 2019.
Delkar was elected as Independent in 1989, on a Congress ticket in 1991 and 1996 (Congress), as a Bharatiya Janata Party candidate in 1998, as an Independent in 1999, and as a BNP candidate in 2004, but lost to the BJP’s Natubhai G.Patil in 2009 and 2014.After severing links with the Congress, he was elected to the 17th Lok Sabha in 2019 as an Independent.
Last year, he entered into a tie-up with the Janata Dal-United headed by Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, for the local bodies elections in the UT.
Survived by his wife, a son and daughter, Delkar was strong champion for tribals, launched the Adivasi Vikas Sangathan in 1985 and subsequently took his first steps in politics as a trade unionist in Silvassa.
In 1967, his father Sanjibhai R.Delkar was elected on a Congress ticket for one term but after the Congress split in 1969, threw in his lot with the breakaway INC(O) faction headed by Morarji Desai and lost the 1971 Lok Sabha polls as its nominee.
(Quaid Najmi can be contacted at q.najmi@ians
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