HASSAN: Vijaya, Assistant Commissioner, Hassan, became the second female officer in less than a week to attempt suicide. Days after Roopa Tembada, 32, mother of a two-year-old and a woman constable at Vijayanagar police station in Bengaluru, swallowed a cocktail of pain-killers after she was harrassed by a male superior, Vijaya, hung herself from a ceiling fan at her residence in Hassan, using a saree. Thanks to timely intervention by her family, she was saved.

Before the Assistant Commissioner tried to end her life, she is said to have called Additional Superintendent of Police Shobha Rani and told her that she was committing suicide as she was being harassed.

Shobha Rani alerted Vijaya’s family, who broke open the locked door to her room. Sumitra, Vijaya’s mother, told the media that her daughter was being harassed by Deputy Commissioner Umesh Kusugal and Additional Deputy Commissioner Janaki.

Vijaya had returned home at around 4 pm and went into her room and the suicide attempt came to the family's notice at 5.30 pm. Barely a month back, Vijaya was transferred as Chief Administrative Officer at Hassan Institute of Medical Sciences (HIMS) and she was replaced by H.L. Nagaraj. Later, Vijaya moved Karnataka Administrative Tribunal and got back to her post.