Unable to cope with father’s refusal to buy smartphone, boy goes missing; later found hanging, father hangs himself with same rope | Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar News – Times of India

Unable to cope with his father’s refusal, the boy hanged himself, prompting the father to do the same upon discovering his son’s body. Police are investigating the circumstances surrounding the incident.

CHHATRAPATI SAMBHAJINAGAR: A Std X student’s aspiration for a smartphone and his farmer father’s inability to afford the gadget took a tragic turn as both were found hanging from a tree on their family farm in a Nanded village.
Police on Friday said that upon spotting the 16-year-old boy hanging from the tree on the farm at Minaki in Biloli tehsil on Thursday morning, his father also hanged himself from the same tree.
The teenager was the youngest of three brothers, and they were staying in a hostel in Udgir of Latur district. Omkar came home to celebrate Makar Sankranti. A police officer said the family members stated the boy requested his father to buy him a smartphone for academic purposes. However, he could not afford to buy the gadget because of financial constraints.
Superintendent of police (Nanded) Abinash Kumar told TOI: “We have registered a case of accidental death on the basis of the statement of the boy’s mother. We are verifying the circumstances that led to the incident.”
Farmer refused phone to son as he owed money in loans
Sub-inspector Dilip Munde, who is investigating the case, said the woman stated that her boy was, for a while, requesting her husband for a cellphone.
“She said the boy again raised the issue on Wednesday evening. However, his father expressed his inability to purchase a smartphone because he was repaying loans he took for the farm and a vehicle. Upset over his father’s response, the boy left home,” he said.
“His parents thought that the boy might have gone to the farm to sleep. As he did not return home the following morning, his parents and two brothers started a search. His father was the one to reach the farm first and saw the boy hanging from a tree. Shocked by the sight, he brought the boy’s body down and hanged himself with the same rope from the tree,” Munde said.
The twin suicides came to light after other members of the family reached the farm, the officer said. On learning about the incident, a police team reached the spot and took both to the civil hospital, where doctors declared them dead on arrival, the officer said.
Police said their last rites were performed in their village on Thursday evening after the autopsy.