Debt-stricken auto driver dies, suicide suspected

NASHIK: Succumbing to the pressure of repaying a debt of Rs five lakh, Sharad Aher, a 32 -year-old rickshaw driver, is suspected to have committed suicide near Gorewadi in Nashik Road.
His wife, Kalpana Aher, however thinks that he may have been killed by the people with whom he worked about a year ago. Aher was found dead on the railway tracks, when Kaplana had been to the Upanagar police station to lodge a missing complaint of her husband.
Kalpana stated in the complaint, that her husband was working at Om Bajrang Finance, a finance firm. The director of Om Bajrang, Kiran Kapse, had charged Sharad of misappropriating Rs 13 lakh. A year back, her husband had left the job but was still repaying the debt. She said Kapse used to beat him up and had forcibly taken his signatures on blank bond papers and blank cheques.
Kalpana also said her husband had paid Rs seven lakh, but Kapse was demanding Rs five lakh more. Succumbing to the pressure, Sharad Aher is believed to have comm-itted suicide.
Speaking to TOI, Kalpana said that she also suspected that her husband may have been murdered. “On Saturday evening at around 8.30 pm, my husband called me up and told me that he was coming home. However, after some time, Manish Jadhav, a man who works in the same company as my husband, surprisingly came to our house asking for Sharad. Suspecting that something untoward may have happened, I rushed to the Upanagar police station to lodge a complaint, where I got the information that my husband had committed suicide,” said Kalpana Aher.
She said, Sharad was a rickshaw driver. It was four to five years back that he had got the job with Om Bajrang, which, according to her provides loans to people and recovers the same through daily collection from petty businessmen or hawkers. The Nashik Road police have arrested Kiran Kapse, Babaji Ugale and Manish alias Monty Jadhav.