Tamil magazine editor, wife commit suicide

Chennai: The Editor of Deepam, a fortnightly Tamil spiritual magazine published by the Kalki group, K.R. Srinivasa Ragavan (48) and his wife, S. Janaki alias Rajalakshmi (35), committed suicide by hanging at their apartment at Senthamizh Nagar main road, Ramapuram here on Monday night.

Preliminary investigation revealed that differences between the couple over a property loan they took last year to be the reason behind their act. On Tuesday evening, around 4.30 pm, a colleague of Janaki checked on their home after repeated phone calls went unattended. “The lady works as a teacher at a private school nearby and also takes tuition classes at her second floor apartment. The students who came in the morning left after the door was not opened,” a police officer said.

The woman alerted the neighbours who checked on one of the rooms after climbing on to the sunshade to find Janaki lying on the floor. They broke open the door and found both of them dead in different rooms. The Royala Nagar police was alerted.

Police secured their bodies and moved them to Government Royapettah Hospital for post mortem. “From our investigation, it is learnt they had difficulties paying EMI for a home loan they took recently. Both of them had shared their displeasure with their colleagues and relatives,” an investigating officer said. Raghavan had lowered his wife’s body after she committed suicide and later committed suicide in another room.

The couple has a nine-year-old son, S. Anirudh, studying class four at a nearby school. “They left their son at their relative’s place in Pudukottai only last Friday for the Dasara holidays,” according to Sebastian who lives in the ground floor of the apartment, Muthamizh Illam.