New Delhi: It was an arranged marriage. They met in 2019 on Shaadi.com. She was from Uttar Pradesh’s Jaunpur, and he was from Bihar’s Samastipur. They had a child soon after their wedding, but things drastically changed in 2021. She left their house in Bangalore. He was accused of unnatural sex, dowry harassment, criminal intimidation and domestic violence. An ugly divorce battle started.
On Monday, Bangalore-based techie Atul Subhash’s body was found in his apartment. Near the 34-year-old’s body were the suicide notes mentioning his reasons for taking the extreme step — one four-page-long and another running to 24 pages. An 80-minute-long video, made by Subhash, also went viral.
Subhash’s account of events leading up to his suicide has reignited concerns over the misuse of 498A, the section in the Indian Penal Code dealing cruelty towards a woman by her husband or his relatives, besides court decisions on the maintenance the man has to pay after a divorce.
This comes in the backdrop of the latest National Crime Records Bureau data showing 1.4 lakh cases under 498A from across India in 2022, and 6,450 dowry deaths in the same period.
“I choose to commit suicide today that seems to be the best option. This will satisfy my wife and mother in law while stopping the funds to wage war on my family and me. It will also expose the corruption of the Judge and madness of this legal system against me and my old parents and brother,” Subhas said in his note.
After Subhash’s death, the Bangalore police registered an FIR against his wife, Nikita Singhania, mother-in-law Nisha Singhania, brother-in-law Anurag Singhania, and Nikita’s uncle Sushil Singhania under the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) sections 108 (abetment of suicide) and 3(5) (joint liability) for “explicit instigation for suicide, harassment, extortion” based on a complaint lodged by Subhash’s younger brother, Bikash.
According to Bikash’s complaint, the accused “lodged false complaints against my brother and forced us to pay Rs 3 crore to settle them and Rs 30 lakhs to meet his son. And, during the court hearings, Nikita and her family told my brother, Atul Subhash, to ‘pay Rs 3 crore or end your life’. For these reasons, my brother Atul, on account of physical and mental pain, took his own life”.
Nikita Singhania works at an IT services firm and currently lives in Delhi.
A senior police officer privy to the matter said, “We are investigating the case. It is a very sensitive matter. We are collecting all evidence and will be recording statements from both parties.”
“Our parents have not been able to come to terms with his death. We now hope that his death does not go to waste and that justice is delivered at the earliest. The investigation must be according to guidelines and not be biased anymore. My brother ended his life after years of harassment,” Bikash Kumar told ThePrint.
The family has gone to Samastipur to carry out Subhash’s last rites.
“They met on Shaadi.com. It was an arranged marriage. Things turned ugly in 2021. Nikita filed multiple cases against my brother and harassed all of us. We want Atul’s son to live with us now. From dowry to violence, she kept filing one fake case after another,” Bikash said.
ThePrint reached out to Nikita Singhania via calls and messages. The report will be updated once her response is received.
When reporters reached their Jaunpur house, her brother Anurag, while refusing to talk, said, “Whatever allegations are made, I will answer them when the time comes. Whatever you want to know, go and find out from the court.”
Amid the uproar following Subhash’s death, the Supreme Court, while hearing a separate divorce case, has laid down eight norms to be taken into consideration during alimony decisions. These include the social and economic status of the husband and the wife, the basic needs of the wife and child or children in the future, the qualification and employment of both individuals, their assets and sources of income, the standard of living of the wife while living with her in-laws, whether the wife left her job to take care of the family, the reasonable amount for legal battle for a while for whoever is not employed, and what the financial status of the husband will be, considering his earnings, and other responsibilities, along with the maintenance allowance.
Saga of ‘harassment’
In his suicide note, Subhash claimed he was burdened with multiple cases by his wife and that she kept extorting money from him. He claimed that she initially demanded Rs 1 crore to settle the cases but later ramped it up to Rs 3 crore. He also mentioned how, in two instances, he was allegedly instigated to die by suicide.
In his 80-minute video, the 34-year-old techie gave details of the harassment he allegedly faced. He mentioned that during a hearing in March this year when he referred to the NCRB data on suicides by men, his wife asked him why he does not die by suicide. Subhash claimed that the judge at the family court laughed at his wife’s comment. During a later hearing outside the courtroom, his mother-in-law allegedly asked why he had not died by suicide yet.
In the video, Subhash asked his family to keep his ashes with them till the matter remains inconclusive and throw the ashes in a gutter near the court if he did not get justice. He also claimed that his wife did not let him meet his son — aged over four years now — and that he wanted the court to hand over the custody of his child to his parents.
“I refuse to get harassed and extorted by the legal system, my wife, my mother in law, my brother in law and uncle of my wife. I have come to the conclusion that till I will keep on working hard and creating values, me and my family will be extorted. I never ever thought that my competence would be used against me. The more money I will make, the more I will fight and the corrupt legal system and my harassers will keep on getting rewarded,” the suicide note read.
“It took me a few months to make sure that I complete my pending responsibilities I had towards my family and finish my work commitments etc. Also a lot of government office work that also led to this delay in suicide. I hope this delay will not go against me and will not help harassers and extorters of me and my family,” he further wrote.
According to Subhash, the fall-out with his wife started from a financial dispute dating back to 2021 when he asked his in-laws to return the Rs 15 lakh he had transferred to them for business purposes but which they instead used to purchase a Rs 1 crore-worth house. The suicide note accused the Singhanias of “demanding” more and more money afterwards. The couple allegedly also had a rift over Nikita’s brother coming to live in their Bangalore home.
“Apart from this, they pressured me to buy land in Jaunpur which I refused. They also pressured me to take their disputed property in lieu of Rs 30 lakhs that I refused,” the note read.
According to Subhash’s claims, the first case from 2022 accusing him of unnatural sex, dowry and criminal intimidation was withdrawn but another case under similar sections was filed later. He also claimed that Nikita asked for Rs 2 lakh per month as maintenance from him and submitted a plea in the Allahabad High Court to fast-track the case filed against him under sections for 498A (cruelty against women by their husbands or their relatives) and 125 (order for maintenance of wives, children and parents) of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC).
The techie also claimed in his suicide note that he had not seen or spoken to their son for the last three years, with screenshots of the WhatsApp messages he sent to his wife asking her to allow him to talk to their son.
“At the beginning of the case, My wife, her mother and Sushil Singhania were demanding Rs 1 Crore for settlement. This amount rose to Rs 3 crore after the interim maintenance of Rs 20000 per month since the time of order. This amount is likely to further rise after the maintenance and arrears payment of Rs 80000 per month that has been awarded for my 4.5 year old son with increased harassment and extortion of mine and my family,” he wrote.
(Edited by Madhurita Goswami)
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