Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar:
She begged, pleaded, stepped forward to try to pull him back, then moved away to make sure he didn’t get startled and lose his balance. This went on for hours, but the mother’s pleas fell on deaf ears.
Eventually, she had to watch her 19-year-old son and her husband hurtle 250 feet to their deaths, leaving her so heartbroken that she followed them seconds later.
A new video that has emerged in the deaths of Kunal Chandgude, 19, and his parents Murlidhar and Sangeeta shows the mother’s helplessness as she tries to deal with a situation she could never have imagined – her son standing on the edge of a cliff, threatening to kill himself, all because of an argument over paying an iPhone’s EMI.
READ | iPhone EMI Behind Teen, Parents’ Deaths In Maharashtra Hill Horror
The clip shows Kunal standing on the edge of the Kohdya Dongar (hill) in Maharashtra’s Chhatrapati Shivajinagar as Sangeeta sits on the ground just a few feet away, crying and entreating him to walk towards her and away from danger. She prostrates herself before her son, and when that doesn’t work, gets up and walks towards him, extending her hand, hoping he will take it.
As the teenager appears to take a step towards the edge, she walks back in a hurry. While much of the audio in the clip is hard to discern, her plaintive “Aye, Kunal”, her voice cracking, pierces through. But even that fails to move the teenager.
She then walks to another edge of the hill, as if threatening to jump off herself, but is pulled back by some people standing nearby.
READ | Father Tries To Pull Back Teen From Cliff Edge, Both Fall. Then Mother Jumps
Officials said Sangeeta repeatedly assured her son that they would help solve whatever problems he had, but he did not budge.
“Mom, no one listens to me. I have no interest in living. There is no solution to my life, nothing is going to get better,” he told her.
The Phone Divide
The officials said Kunal had purchased an iPhone recently but had begun facing issues paying the loan instalments for it. He and his father had a huge argument over this and Kunal then went to the hill around 10 am on Friday. Some people saw him standing on the edge of the cliff, threatening to die by suicide, and tried to dissuade him. His parents arrived soon after, as did personnel from the police and fire departments.
Around 1 pm, after Kunal refused to listen to everyone, including police officials and his village sarpanch, his father, Murlidhar, stepped forward to pull him away from danger. They both lost their footing, however, and plunged to their deaths. Sangeeta jumped four seconds later.
Dog Waits
Local residents said the family had moved into the Ekdant Nagar area of Zhalta village about four months ago. They said the couple and the teenager largely kept to themselves and did not interact much with their neighbours. They were, however, deeply attached to their pet dog.
“The dog is still waiting in the house, hoping his family will return. He has been staring out of the window and has not moved,” said a neighbour.
(With inputs from Mohsin Sheikh)
