Pilibhit firm owner held for abetment after employee found hanging, FIR was for murder

Pilibhit: The owner of a property dealing firm in Pilibhit has been arrested on charges of abetment to suicide after a 25-year-old employee working under him was found hanging on Feb 13.Anil Pal was found hanging from the outer wall of his employer's office. His body was sent for autopsy, which confirmed death due to hanging, indicating suicide.However, in his complaint, Pal's brother Ramautar (37) alleged murder, leading to an FIR under BNS section 103 (murder). He said Anil had been working at Madhur Vani Infra, a property firm in Pilibhit, where he had discovered owner Ved Prakash Kashyap's alleged illicit relationship with a female employee. Following this, Pal quit his job a few days earlier but was rehired by Kashyap on Feb 11.On Feb 13, Pal was allegedly called to Kashyap's office at 4.30 am on the pretext of urgent work. Around 6.30 am, two unidentified men informed the family of his death. The complainant alleged that Kashyap, along with his lover and others, killed Pal and staged the scene to appear as suicide.On Saturday, Pilibhit city BJP MLA and minister of state for sugarcane development and sugar industry, Sanjay Singh Gangwar, intervened and directed SP Sukirti Madhav to suspend Pilibhit Kotwali SHO Satyendra Kumar Yadav for failing to register a murder case.An FIR was subsequently lodged under section 103 (murder). However, Kashyap was arrested on Monday for abetment to suicide, even though the FIR had not yet been formally converted to section 108 (abetment of suicide). He was produced before a remand magistrate around 5pm under section 108, but the court approved his remand under section 103.When asked about the discrepancy, SP Madhav said that after registering the murder FIR, investigators gathered evidence pointing to Kashyap's role in abetting Pal's suicide. "Based on this evidence, he was arrested for abetment to suicide," the SP said.Reacting to the arrest, Supreme Court lawyer Sharddha Sexena and Allahabad high court's Lucknow bench lawyer Shashank Singh said it was an apparent violation of Article 21 of the Constitution, which guarantees the right to life and personal liberty, to arrest him for abetment to suicide before formally altering the FIR from murder to abetment of suicide.