27-year-old woman attempts suicide in front of train; Kasargod police rescue mother of two

Kasargod, Kerala: A young woman who had left home following a disagreement with her mother and was planning to attempt suicide on a railway line was rescued within half an hour by the Melparamba police in Kasargod on Friday. The 27-year-old, a resident of Kalanad village and the mother of two young children, had caused concern among her family and the police.

As her husband works abroad, the woman and her children lived with her mother. At around 12.30 pm on Friday, the mother contacted the landline of the Melparamba Police Station at Chattanchal, requesting urgent help to find and save her daughter, who had left the house.

Senior Civil Police Officer T Rajesh, who was on station duty, received the call and informed Inspector N P Raghavan after obtaining the woman’s phone number. The inspector immediately directed SI V K Aneesh, senior civil police officers T Rajesh and Harish Kadavath, and driver CPO James to trace her.

Repeated calls to the woman initially went unanswered. With assistance from the cyber cell, the police tracked the phone location. When the woman eventually answered, she was crying and unwilling to reveal her whereabouts. She later said she had  taken an autorickshaw to Iduvungal, but phone location data indicated the Chathankai area. Realising the information was misleading, the police kept her on the call and rushed towards Chathankai in a jeep.

During a search along the railway track, the police found the woman hiding in nearby bushes at around 1.05 pm. She told officers that she had been waiting for a train. The police consoled her and brought her safely to the Melparamba Police Station, informing her mother immediately.

The mother arrived at the station with relatives and broke down on seeing her daughter, distressed that a minor argument had led her to such a decision, especially with two small children depending on her. After counselling by the police, the woman returned home with her mother, while the officers expressed satisfaction at how timely intervention had saved a life.

(Suicide is never a solution. Seek help from mental health professionals. Call the DISHA helpline at the  toll-free number: 1056 or 0471 2552056.)