Manamadurai central excise official ends life in Sivagangai

Manamadurai: Muthukumaran, 53, Central Commercial Tax Assistant Commissioner, committed suicide at his brother's house at Manamadurai town in Sivagangai district on Tuesday. Muthukumaran's brother Swaminathan and his family members were shocked to find him hanging in a room on the first floor of their house on Tuesday morning.

The officer left a suicide note in which he stated he had borrowed money from the bank for the construction of his house and his wife Vasuki had no involvement in it, revealed Muthukrishnan, SIPCOT police station inspector who is in additional charge of Manamadurai police station. Muthukumaran had worked as assistant commissioner of the Central Commercial Tax at Chennai and his wife is working as superintendent of Civil Supplies department in Chennai. Their son Arun is studying ME in a private engineering college.

Muthukumaran had visited his brother's house on Monday evening to meet his aged mother Gandhimathi (83). After he spent a few minutes talking with her and other family members, he went to the room on the first floor for sleep, the police said.

When asked about an unconfirmed report that Muthukumaran took this extreme step fearing an inquiry in the department, inspector Muthukrishnan said he had spoken to senior officials in the Commercial Tax department about his death, but nobody had communicated any such information to him.

The inquiry with his brother Swaminathan revealed that only after the death of their father two years ago that Muthukumaran started visiting his house. All these years, Muthukumaran had shared a close relationship with his wife's family, the police said. "As of now we have registered suicide case. We need to conduct a thorough investigation to ascertain the cause of the death," he said.