ஹிந்துஜா மகன் தீமூட்டி தற்கொலை .. காதல் ஜோடியை வேட்டை ஆடிய ஹிந்துஜா குடும்பம் . காட்டி கொடுத்த பிரதமர் நரசிம்மராவ்

 ராதா மனோகர் : இன்று சிக்கலில் மாட்டியிருக்கும் ஹிந்துஜா குடும்பத்தின் செல்ல மகன் தனது மனைவியோடு தீமூட்டி தற்கொலை செய்து கொண்ட வரலாறு
இதில் மனைவி தப்பி விட்டார் . ஆனால் மகன் தரம் ஹிந்துஜா உயிரிழந்தார்
இவர்களின் திருமணத்தை ஏற்றுக்கொள்ளாத ஹிந்துஜா குடும்பம் இந்த காதல் ஜோடிக்கு பெரும் தொல்லை கொடுத்தது
இவர்களின் கழுகு பார்வையில் இருந்து தப்புவதற்கு மொரிசியஸ் ஹோட்டல் ஒன்றில் இரகசியமாக தங்கி இருந்தார்கள்

ஹிந்துஜா குடும்ப நண்பரான பிரதமர் நரசிம்ம ராவ் சி பி ஐ மூலம் இதை கண்டிறிந்து ஹிந்துஜாக்களிடம் காட்டி கொடுத்தார்
போலீஸ் அவர்கள் தங்கி இருந்த ஹோட்டலை சுற்றி வளைத்து
அதை கண்ட ஹிந்துஜா ஜோடி தீமூட்டி தற்கொலைக்கு முயன்றது
இதில் தரம் ஹிந்துஜா இறந்தார் மனைவி நிநோய்ச்கா தப்பி விட்டார்
உகாண்டாவில் இருந்து இடி அமினால் துரத்தப்பட்டு இங்கிலாந்தில் வசித்து வந்த இவர்கள் மிகப்பெரிய பணக்காரர்கள்
இவர்களின் சொத்து மதிப்பு 47 பில்லியன் டாலர்களாகும்.
அந்த பழைய செய்தியை வாசியுங்கள்.
indiatoday.in  :  Hinduja heir Dharam fails to cope with family pressures against his wife, ends life
M. RahmanAmit RoyISSUE DATE: Jun 15, 1992 | UPDATED: Aug 26, 2013 17:05 IST
The housemaster at Westminster School in London called him a 'delightful boy'. A former classmate at the school described him as 'quiet and gentle'.
Amongst his family, his parents Srichand and Madhu adored their only son. This was natural enough but even the wider family of aunts, uncles and cousins doted on the 22-year-old boy who had everything he could possibly want.

The circumstances that led to Dharam Hinduja's ghastly death by self-immolation on the island paradise of Mauritius seem to have begun with the act of falling in love.

No one knows exactly when and how he met Ninotchka Hebzibah Sargon (also 22), a pretty Anglo-Indian girl, but it may have been in Bombay where the Hindujas own a vast mansion on Juhu beach, or in the US where Ninotchka's brother lives.

Despite strong opposition from the family-orthodox Sindhi Hindus-the two lovers married secretly in London in January. The family still couldn't accept the union. In an attempt to separate the two, Dharam was sent back to Bombay to stay with his uncle Ashok in the family home.

Adored by his parents and loved by friends, the Hinduja heir couldn't cope with family pressures against his wife. It cost him his life.

The marriage and his parents' reaction to it overturned the smooth course of Dharam's life. He had been an all-rounder, as happy playing tennis and cricket for Westminster as getting top grades in geography and mathematics. Having graduated from Wharton Business School in Philadelphia, Dharam was planning to return to the US to study corporate law at Georgetown University in Washington DC.

But tragedy intervened. On May 13, the police in Bombay were alerted to the fact that Dharam's Maruti 1000 had been found abandoned near the house. Their instant reaction was to assume a kidnapping. However, after taking a closer look at the car, Additional Commissioner A.A. Khan had second thoughts: "It appeared too amateurish to be a kidnap carried out by gangsters."

Dharam had, in fact, escaped from the tight ring the family was trying to form around him. He asked a friend in London to buy him a ticket to Mauritius with instructions that it would be collected by the passenger at Bombay's Sahar International Airport. He was to meet Ninotchka at the island. The abandoned car was merely a ruse to gain some time before being discovered.

Pramod K. Gujadhur, the Air Mauritius regional manager in Bombay, recalled how he looked when he picked up the ticket at Sahar airport: "He was casually dressed in a denim outfit, with a jacket slung over his shoulder and he was looking very relaxed."

Ninotchka arrived too, in this case from Paris where Dharam had sent her after their marriage, and they both checked into a cheap guest-house. The plan was apparently to fly out a couple of days later to Australia where Ninotchka's mother, Rita Sargon lives. The huge family-Ninotchka is the youngest of 11 children-emigrated to Perth six years after her father, Wing Commander Douglas Sargon, an ex-iAF officer, died of a heart attack in 1979.

Ninotchka's uncle, Harry Sargon, who is Air India's manager in Tanzania, said they were a loving family: "They were very close-knit. We lost contact after they moved to Perth, but I remember Ninotchka as a bright, very pretty girl."

Dharam's attempt to throw his family off the scent failed miserably. They knew exactly where he was within 24 hours of his disappearance. Srichand and Madhu chartered a private plane and flew out on May 15.

Mauritius is a small place and Dharam soon discovered that his family had arrived and had moved into the luxurious Royal Palm Hotel. In fact, Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao even rang his Mauritian counterpart asking the local police to assist the Hindujas.

The moment they knew the police were on their trail, the couple fled the guest-house and checked into another hotel. It was at this point that something snapped in Dharam's mind.

Realising it was only a question of time before they were tracked down, Dharam decided to end his life, for reasons which perhaps only Ninotchka can know and which his parents and two sisters will no doubt agonise over for the rest of their lives.

At 9.45 a.m. on May 16, Dharam doused the mattress with paint thinner and set it alight. The details of exactly what happened in the room are still hazy but from the sketchy outline which the Mauritius police have provided-based on Ninotchka's statement-they intended to die together by inhaling the toxic fumes.

They took the precaution of sealing the doors and windows. In another macabre precaution, they tied each other's hands. Somehow, though, Ninotchka managed to free herself. The police say she gave them a demonstration of how she did it.

The plan went wrong when a passing maid noticed smoke coming out from under the door of Room 3 03. When the door was broken down, Dharam, whose clothes were on fire, flung open the window and tried to jump.

The maid heard Ninotchka, whose hands had been singed, scream: "Don't do it! I love you, I love you." The rush of air from the window fanned the flames, engulfing the young man. He suffered 60 per cent burns.

He was promptly taken back by his family to a London hospital, accompanied by Ninotchka. On May 19, he succumbed to his injuries. A distraught uncle telephoned a family friend: "Please tell our friends what has happened. I can't."

Hundreds of mourners gathered at the Hindujas' massive home at Carlton House Terrace in London. It was a traditional ceremony with two Hindu priests sprinkling water from the Ganges onto the body. The next day his body was flown to Bombay, and cremated at the Santa Cruz crematorium, not far from where Ninotchka had lived as a girl.

The Hindujas with relatives: grief-stricken

Back in Britain, Dharam's death raised the hoary old issue of Indian families being unable to manage the tensions inherent in combining eastern and western cultures. From the Hindujas' point of view, the linking of a Hindu and a Catholic family, however respectable, may not have been ideal.

But in similar circumstances most parents, faced with sufficient resolve by a young couple in love, would have relented. As a family friend observed: "The Hindujas were perhaps victims of their orthodoxy. We have got to be able to adjust ourselves to new and changing circumstances. If we are too rigid, there will be tragic consequences."

The pity of it is that there were none of the dark conflicts in the Hinduja family which often occur between an all-powerful billionaire father and a son who invariably has to live in his shadow.

Hinduja is the richest Asian - worth an estimated Rs 7,150 crore ( 1,300 million) - in the UK. By all accounts, Dharam greatly admired his 56-year-old father. As a director of the London-based family business, he could often be found closeted with his father in the office.

In a recent remark to the dean of Wharton Business School, he paid an affectionate tribute to Srichand: "It's an honour to work with him. I have learnt so much from my father."

What made Dharam take his life in the hotel room may never be fully explained-although a coroner's court in London will attempt to unravel the mystery when an inquest opens on June 3.

If he felt torn between the demands of his family and his love for Ninotchka, it is possible that when he set himself alight he must have been convinced that death was the only way out.

Yet, when he was taken to London, the Hindujas took Ninotchka with them, and Srichand told the police in Mauritius: "She is one of our own." The irony of his remark has been totally submerged by the tragedy.