This became the genesis of the teenager’s fight with his family that eventually led to a massive tragedy, police in Maharashtra’s Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar said on Friday. As phone cameras kept rolling, the teenager and his father fell to their deaths, only to be followed by his mother, who jumped off the cliff. Kunal, 18, managed to buy an iPhone but could not afford to pay the instalments.
Kunal had bought an iPhone and had been asking his family for money to pay the EMIs, according to police officials. This led to a heated argument with his father over the latest payment.
Police have not yet shared further details on the circumstances of the family dispute, or whether the teenager had been battling depression as had been reported initially. Sanjay Jadhav, a former sarpanch of Tisgaon village, was among those who tried to reason with Kunal. “We pleaded with him a lot, that he should look at his mother, that he shouldn’t jump, that he was educated and had a future ahead of him. Kunal’s response through much of the standoff was shrugging of shoulders and insisting that death remained his only way . His parents followed him to the spot and, along with other locals, spent close to three hours trying to persuade him to come down. It was not clear why a safety net could not be set up if police and fire department personnel were also present on the scene. All three died on the spot. Police recovered the bodies and sent them for post-mortem examination. The incident was witnessed by a number of local residents and tourists who had gathered at the site during the hours-long standoff, with parts of the effort to talk Kunal down captured on video.
Others told him they’d get him an iPhone 15 Pro. This led to a heated argument with his father over the latest payment, after which an angry Kunal left home and climbed a hill in the Tisgaon area, under Waluj MIDC police station limits, around 10 am.
We made every appeal we could,” Jadhav said. Kunal had bought an iPhone and had been asking his family for money to pay the EMIs, according to police officials. A case has been registered, and further legal proceedings are underway, officials said.
