A Week After His Ex-Manager Died In Fall From Bldg; Found Hanging In His Bandra Apartment
V Narayan & Nitasha Natu | TNN (THE TIMES OF INDIA; June 15, 2020)

Mumbai: Hindi film industry star Sushant Singh Rajput (34), whose boyish charm and emotional range stood out in films that blended realism with the demands of commercial cinema, was found dead on Sunday in his duplex apartment at Bandra in Mumbai.

His body was found around 1.30pm after his domestic help, who tried to wake him up for lunch, found the bedroom door locked and called in a locksmith to open it. Sushant’s stylist and manager were in the flat when the room was opened. Police said he was found hanging.

A police team probing the case said the actor, best known for his convincing performances in Kai Po Che and an M S Dhoni biopic, was under treatment for depression and was on medication. Days ago, one of his former managers, Disha Salian, had allegedly ended her life.

Sushant had an unlikely background for a mainstream Bollywood star. The son of a retired Bihar government employee and a winner at the National Physics Olympiad, he had enrolled for a mechanical engineering degree at Delhi College of Engineering before he decided to follow his heart.

Sushant Singh Rajput trained under Shiamak Davar in dance and Barry John in acting before breaking into the big league with Kai Po Che, a film based on a Chetan Bhagat novel on the Gujarat riots. News of his death led to an outpouring of grief from fellow artistes on social media.

Sushant's last conversation may have been with an elder sister, said police on Sunday. “Rajput’s sister told us he called her on Sunday morning. We have to record her statement to know the exact conversation they had. He also spoke with a friend, a model-actor named Mahesh Krishna Shetty,” said an officer at Bandra police station. He was last seen when he came out of his bedroom to pick up a glass of juice around 9 am. He had spent the previous night in the company of a few associates.

Rajput’s family members have told the police that he was under treatment for depression. He is survived by his father and four sisters. His mother had died in 2002 when he was 16. One of his final posts on social media on June 3 was a tribute to his mother. It said, “Blurred past evaporating from teardrops.. Unending dreams carving an arc of smile.. And a fleeting life, negotiating between the two...#Maa”.

Sushant was last seen in the movie, Chhichhore, that released in September 2019.

For a while during the lockdown, he was living with the family of his friend Rhea Chakraborty. He later moved back into his own house, a rented duplex flat at Bandra’s Mont Blanc apartment on Carter Road.

Mumbai police spokesperson DCP Pranaya Ashok said the death appeared to be a suicide but they had not found a suicide note. The police have recorded the statement of his friend Rhea, model-actor Mahesh Krishna Shetty, his house help and others who were present in the flat. Police are also scanning the actor’s mobile for clues.

Rajput’s body has been kept at Cooper hospital. His father will reach Mumbai from Patna on Monday.