Kolkata: A 40-year-old man climbed atop an iron structure of the busy bridge number 4 at Park Circus, threatening to commit suicide and disrupting normal traffic for over 20 minutes, around 2.40 pm on Monday.
The man has been grappling with intense emotional strain after parting ways with his wife and facing concurrent financial challenges due to losses in his business, explained the officer.
“Around 2.30pm, he was taking his elder daughter to Science City on his two-wheeler. He suddenly stopped near the bridge and told her that his mobile phone had fallen somewhere on the road and he was trying to spot it. Leaving her standing on the road, he climbed up the bridge and then threatened to jump off,” the policeman said.
Onlookers said that a group from the nearby police station, along with members of Kolkata Police Disaster Management Group (DMG) and the fire department, arrived at the location and began conversing with him, he explained.
“We spoke to his daughter to understand the problem and accordingly planned the conversation to convince and bring him down. And finally, after we made the offers, he agreed to come down,” the policeman said.
Police are concerned that if the man had fallen from the bridge, he might have either collided with electric poles or landed on the railway tracks below, resulting in serious injuries to him.