Cab driver dies by suicide after setting himself on fire in Bengaluru
Bengaluru, Jan 24 (PTI): A 39-year-old cab driver died by suicide after setting himself on fire with kerosene outside his estranged wife's house here over family feud, police said on Friday.
The deceased has been identified as Manjunath, who hailed from Tumakuru, they said.
The incident occurred on Thursday night in an area that comes under Jnanabharathi police station limits, they added.
Preliminary inquiry has revealed that there were disputes between Manjunath and his wife Nayana Raj, who is a makeup artist. Due to feud, they were living separately since 2023. Nayana had filed a case in the court, a senior police officer said.
However, Manjunath was not in favour of divorce and used to come regularly to her apartment and plead that he would live with her peacefully without causing trouble. During his visits, he tried to convince her to not divorce him, he said.
On Thursday morning, Manjunath went to his wife's house but she refused to open the door. Enraged with it, he returned to her house at 11 pm and allegedly set himself on fire with Kerosene and died in front of her apartment, said S Girish, Deputy Commissioner of Police (West Bengaluru).
According to police, Manjunath had fallen in love with Nayana. Going against the wish of family, he married her at Dharmasthala in 2016. Since then they were living in Vimaleshwara Kripa, Jnanabharathi NGEF Layout.
They have a nine-year-old son studying in Class 4.
A case has been registered under section 194 (Police to enquire and report on suicide, etc) of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, police said.
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Congress using hijab issue to pacify minority anger, alleges Karnataka LoP R Ashoka
Bengaluru: Leader of Opposition in the Assembly R. Ashoka has accused the Congress government of using the hijab issue to placate what he described as discontent among minority voters after the Davanagere by-election.
In a post on X on Wednesday, Ashoka alleged that the state government, instead of addressing issues such as price rise, corruption, farmers’ distress and law and order, was attempting to retain its minority vote base by reviving the hijab issue.
Referring to the 2022 dress code introduced by the BJP government, which prohibited hijab in schools and colleges, Ashoka said the Karnataka High Court had upheld the policy and emphasised the importance of discipline in educational institutions.
He questioned the Congress government’s move to revisit the issue and asked whether setting aside the court-backed policy to benefit one community could be described as secularism.
Ashoka further alleged that while the government was willing to permit hijab, it continued to prohibit saffron shawls.
He accused the government of dividing students on religious lines rather than treating schools and colleges as spaces of equality.
Drawing a comparison with Mamata Banerjee’s government in West Bengal, Ashoka claimed that excessive appeasement politics had harmed the state and warned that the Congress in Karnataka could face a similar political response.
He said voters in Karnataka would teach the Congress a lesson for what he termed “vote-bank politics” and for compromising constitutional and judicial principles.
