The Mumbai Police, in its investigation into Bollywood actor Sushant Singh Rajput’s suicide, took down the statement of his father K. K. Singh before the bereaved parent returned home sadly to Patna. In it, K. K. Singh told the police that through their conversations he never got the impression that Sushant was suffering from depression. He behaved normally, the father said. The actor did mention that some major projects he was looking forward to doing had got scrapped.
“But he never told me who did this and why,” the actor’s father clarified to the police. Sushant had also expressed his concern about the delicate situation Bollywood found itself in during the Covid-19 lockdown with shootings being cancelled, theatres shut and releases postponed. This he did told his father and sisters. “In the last few months, two or three times Sushant told me that the prevailing tension in the film industry had made him feel low,” his father said.
The discordant note in the father’s statement was about people around Sushant who misused their friendship with him. Instead of being a support system to the actor in his hour of need, they were a burden on Sushant, the father bitterly added. But when he suggested to Sushant that he would come to Mumbai from Patna and stay with him, the son quickly assured the father that he would get out of these problems himself and all would be well.
While he got a vague sense that his son was troubled, K. K. Singh told the police, Sushant never used the word “depression” and nor did the father know that the actor was under treatment for the medical condition.