Police said, a suicide note found on the 80-year-old MLA’s body said he was taking the extreme step due to acute depression and a number of other ailments including kidney-related problems for some time. A senior police officer said Quasem had been admitted to the SSKM Hospital on 26 May as he was suffering from infection in the urinary tract. He returned to the hostel yesterday evening with his son, Mr Masum Bin Quasem, after he was discharged.
This afternoon, his daughter-in-law, Sonali, came to meet him and brought homemade food with her. She helped him eat food. Later around 4.45 p.m. when Mr Quasem went to see off his wife, the MLA apparently jumped from the balcony of the apartment. His bodyguard was not nearby at that moment, as he knew the MLA was with his son and daughter-in-law, police said.
Chief minister Miss Mamata Banerjee, who was in a meeting with the Union finance minister, Pranab Mukherjee, rushed to the spot along with the state commerce and industries minister Partha Chatterjee and mayor Sovan Chatterjee. Speaker Hashim Abdul Halim and other senior CPI-M leaders also visited the spot.
“It is unfortunate that one of our colleagues, Mustafabhai, is no more. He ended his life before I got the opportunity to know him during the Assembly session. Had I known him I could have counselled him and ensured his treatment,” she told media.
In recently held Assembly elections Mostafa defeated Sardar Amjad Ali of the Trinamul Congress. He was first elected to the West Bengal Assembly in 1977 from Baduria, and again from 1991 onwards from Swarupnagar. He was also a Rajya Sabha MP from 1984 to 1990 and was the Vice-Chairman of the Upper House from 1987 to 1988.
