After Rohtak ASI’s death, FIR names late IPS officer’s family

Rohtak: A day after Haryana Chief Minister Nayab Singh Saini visited the grieving family of Assistant Sub-Inspector (ASI) Sandeep Kumar Lather in Rohtak, the police registered an FIR in the alleged suicide, naming the wife of late IPS officer Y Puran Kumar, IAS officer Amneet P Kumar, and her brother Bathinda (Rural) MLA Amit Rattan as accused.

The FIR also names two others linked to the late IPS officer. The case has sharply escalated political and administrative tensions already inflamed by the senior IPS officer’s death by alleged suicide on October 7 in Chandigarh.

On Thursday, forensic formalities were completed at the Pandit Bhagwat Dayal Sharma Post Graduate Institute of Medical Sciences (PGIMS), Rohtak, after a night of negotiations between district officials and the family, who had earlier refused a post-mortem examination until a criminal case was opened.

Later in the day, Union minister and former Haryana CM Manohar Lal Khattar met the family and assured them that the government would provide a job to Lather’s wife and take care of their children's education expenses.

One week, two deaths
The Rohtak case unfolded barely a week after ADGP (IPS) Y Puran Kumar was found dead at his Chandigarh residence on October 7. His suicide note blamed of caste-based humiliation and harassment at the hands of senior officer. After days of stalemate, his post-mortem was completed on October 15. His body was cremated on the same day in Chandigarh. The events kept the state on edge and triggered protests and political demands for an impartial probe.

On October 14, Lather, 41, posted with the Cyber Cell in Rohtak, was found dead of a gunshot wound. 

FIR and what it says
According to sources, Rohtak police registered the FIR for abetment to suicide and criminal conspiracy under the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita. Those named include Amneet P Kumar (IAS), Amit Rattan (MLA, Bathinda Rural), ASI Sushil Kumar, and others. 

The FIR has invoked Section 108 (abetment to suicide) and Section 61 (criminal conspiracy) of the BNS. The government, meanwhile, has sent DGP Shatrujeet Kapur on leave and named OP Singh as acting DGP, and has also transferred Rohtak SP Narendra Bijarniya.

Politics and the optics
The FIR has lent fresh urgency to the Lather case.

Khattar’s unannounced stop at PGIMS added a dramatic political layer: he urged that the matter not be given a caste colour, and promised strict action within the ambit of law while explicitly assuring the widow’s job and education support for the children —commitments amplified by Hindi media outlets.

Across party lines, leaders have called for judicial oversight. Former CM Bhupinder Singh Hooda demanded that both deaths be probed under the watch of a sitting High Court judge; INLD’s Abhay Chautala has pitched for a CBI probe monitored by the court. In Gurgaon, a municipal employees’ union march labelled the IPS officer’s death an “institutional murder,” citing caste discrimination and demanding urgent action.

Cremation in Jind
Authorities said Lather's cremation would take place with police honours at Julana in Jind, the ASI’s native place, where crowds have gathered to pay their last respects. Senior Cabinet ministers of Haryana Government, acting DGP OP Singh are likely to attend the cremation. A police department has been decked up with garlands alike a 'matryr' to carry Lather's body to Jind for cremation. 

Police sources and the initial FIR narrative suggest investigators will now move to secure and authenticate the ASI’s video, examine his communications, and trace the chain of events around the bribery/extortion case in which an associate of the late IPS officer was arrested shortly before the IPS’s death. 

Notably, Lather had been part of the team that apprehended a head constable alleged to have demanded a bribe “in the name of” the IPS officer — an arrest that, the family claims, was followed by threats and escalatory pressure. These threads will likely form the core of the Rohtak investigation. 

The twin investigations
The Chandigarh SIT continues to handle the IPS officer’s death probe. After an eight-day deadlock, post-mortem was finally conducted on October 15, allowing cremation later that day; the medico-legal findings are to be handed to the SIT. Separately, Rohtak police are probing the ASI’s death, with the FIR naming civil and police officials by role and relationship. Both cases are now intertwined in the public mind because of overlapping names and allegation.

A state on edge, and a credibility test
Back-to-back deaths have placed Haryana’s police and political leadership under the scrutiny. The government’s quick administrative reshuffle at the top and the on-camera promises of relief to a bereaved family are not substitutes for due process; they are signals to a public that has learned to read optics. If these promises—*job to the widow, education support for children, state honours—*are delivered swiftly and transparent progress is visible in both FIR-driven investigations, the state may reclaim a measure of trust that has clearly frayed this October.

For now, Jind prepares for a cremation that many had hoped would never happen, while Chandigarh counts the days until the SIT’s next move.