₹20 Crore Debt & Suicide Pact: What Led 7 Members Of Family End Their Lives

It has come to light that Praveen Mittal, who, along with six other family members, died in an alleged suicide pact, was under immense debt amounting to around Rs 20 crore. The cousin of the deceased made this shocking revelation.

Praveen Mittal, his parents, wife, and three children died by suicide on Monday night. In a note left behind by the family, they requested that Mittal’s cousin, Sandeep Agarwal, perform their last rites.

According to reports, Mittal had built a scrap factory in Himachal Pradesh’s Baddi a few years ago, which was later seized by the bank due to mounting debt.

Under financial pressure, Mittal decided to leave Panchkula and moved to Dehradun, where he remained for six years. During this time, he did not contact his family.

The debt had piled up to around Rs 20 crore when the family took the extreme step.

After relocating several times, first to Kharar in Punjab, then to Pinjore in Haryana, where he lived with his wife’s father, he had returned to Panchkula just a month prior. Originally from Barwala in Hisar, Mittal worked as a taxi driver in Panchkula’s Saketri area. Financial troubles had led the bank to confiscate his two apartments and vehicles.

On Monday, the family from Dehradun had attended a religious gathering at Bageshwar Dham. During their return journey, they reportedly ingested poison in a collective suicide.

A local resident discovered the tragedy during an evening walk when he noticed a car with Uttarakhand licence plates parked behind his vehicle. A man, later identified as Praveen Mittal, was sitting on the pavement beside the car.

The neighbours found it suspicious that a towel was draped over the vehicle. When he and his brother questioned the man, he explained that they were returning from Bageshwar Dham and had been unable to find accommodation, so they planned to sleep in their car overnight. The resident suggested they move to the market area instead.

As the man stood to relocate the vehicle, the resident sensed something was amiss. Peering inside the car, he was met with a horrifying sight—six lifeless bodies in a foul-smelling vehicle.

The resident described seeing six people lying motionless, having vomited, with a terrible odour emanating from the car. When confronted, the man revealed that his family had died in a suicide pact and predicted his own death within minutes, citing overwhelming debt as the reason.

Despite being rushed to the hospital, all family members were pronounced dead. According to the resident, the man might have survived with a quicker medical response.