Congress leader and Wayanad MP Rahul Gandhi met the wife of a tribal man who was found hanging after being accused of theft in Kalpetta on Monday amid an outcry against injustice to the farm labourer.

On his first visit to his constituency after the Bharat Jodo Yatra, Rahul met the widow of Vishwanathan, 46, who was found hanging near the Government Medical College hospital in Kozhikode on Saturday (February 11), two days after he went missing from the hospital where his wife had delivered a baby boy.

Rahul visited Vishwanathan’s home in Kalpetta on Monday morning along with senior party leaders amid allegations of injustice and police apathy in registering a missing person’s complaint filed by his mother-in-law, Leela, who was present when a mob assaulted him ignoring her pleas and cries for help.

Rahul met Vishwanathan’s widow, Bindu, and her newborn and promised to intervene in the matter and ensure justice for her husband.

Vishwanathan, who was at the hospital where his wife Bindu delivered on Wednesday, was beaten by some persons on Thursday for allegedly stealing a mobile phone and some cash.

He was allegedly taken to the hospital security officer who asked them to lodge a police complaint if they felt Vishwanathan had stolen their belongings.

However, an apparently petrified Vishwanathan fled the scene, leaving behind his bag that had his mobile phone and lunch box.

His mother-in-law approached the police cell at the medical college when the family could not trace him until late on Thursday. But the police allegedly refused to register the complaint.

The police eventually registered a suicide case after Vishwanathan’s body was found hanging from a tree in an isolated spot near the medical college. But the family insisted that he could not commit suicide and cited the blood on his nose and legs as proof of him being murdered and hanged.

The police then registered a case of unnatural death and launched an investigation.

The Kerala State Human Rights Commission has directed the police to file a report in a week. The incident immediately drew comparisons with the mob lynching of a mentally unstable tribal youth named Madhu, 27, in Attappadi in Palakkad district in February 2018.

He was fatally assaulted by local people who accused him of stealing some provisions from a grocery store, triggering a massive outcry.

Disturbing images of a badly-assaulted Madhu had gone viral on social media, raising questions about the safety of the oppressed communities in the state otherwise known for its high literacy and human development indices. Madhu died a little later allegedly due to the brutal assault.

Several men were arrested in the case pending at a Palakkad court. Rights activist and president of Adivasi Vanitha Prasthanam, Ammini Wayanad, termed Vishwanathan’s death as “yet another act of gross injustice to the tribal people in Kerala”.

“Had this been in Uttar Pradesh, our progressive and Left activists would have hit the streets of Kerala with cries for justice. But no such voices are being heard now,” Ammini told The Telegraph on Monday. Her organisation is part of a daylong sit-in scheduled to be held outside the Wayanad collectorate on Friday, seeking justice for Vishwanathan by booking those who assaulted him for murder.

“We also want the government to adopt his family since he was the sole breadwinner,” she said, adding that the tribal people are always victims of injustice.

A tribal youth named Deepu, who was then 22, was arrested in November 2021 in Wayanad for allegedly stealing a car. The police had booked a case although his relatives argued he didn’t know how to drive. He was later released on bail while the case is pending in a local court.