Bigg Boss Kannada Winner M Pratham went live on Facebook announcing that he was going to take his life as he felt humiliated by comments that a colleague from the industry had made on him on social media. The incident took place in Bengaluru on Tuesday.
M Pratham, who also goes by the name Olle Huduga Pratham (‘Good Boy Pratham’ in Kannada) – is in his early 20s and won the Kannada Bigg Boss’ Season 4 three months back. He has, since, signed a couple of Kannada movies.
On Tuesday night, Pratham popped some sleeping pills live on camera and said this would be his last Facebook interaction. He added that he hoped to have instilled some shame in the minds of others who put up derogatory insults on social media, similar to what he suffered from a director.
Police sources say that Pratham took only a few pills that didn’t do any lasting damage. He is now out of danger, and police may consider slapping a case under IPC 309 (for attempted suicide) against him – though attempted suicide has now been decriminalised by the Mental Healthcare Bill passed by the Parliament last week. The bill is yet to get the President’s assent to become law.
Before the act, he gave a 4-minute speech to his friends about being depressed after an amateur director, Lokesh, allegedly humiliated him on social media. Lokesh later alleged that he was man-handled by Pratham during an argument much before the public spat. Lokesh had also filed a police complaint over being pushed around and attacked by the actor.
Pratham, in his ‘live’ speech on Facebook, said he wanted to teach Lokesh a lesson by taking this extreme step, and hoped that “at least after his death,” people would think twice before posting derogatory comments about others.
While some sympathised with Pratham and hoped he would emerge emotionally stronger, others termed it as a publicity stunt.
Pratham’s co-contestant at Bigg Boss Niranjan Deshpande, for instance, said, “We all knew he did a lot of drama in the (Bigg Boss) house, but didn’t know he would stoop so low. Anyone who commits suicide, will not announce it to the whole world.”
“Pratham will do anything for publicity, but I don’t know if this act was also for publicity. If he is done this to gain attention, its wrong,” said, Bhuvan Ponanna, another Big Boss co-contestant said.
Source: News18