Chandigarh/Rohtak, Oct. 31 -- Believed to be the proximate trigger behind the suicide of IPS officer Y Puran Kumar, the first information report (FIR) registered by Rohtak police on October 6 against Sushil Kumar, a cop deployed with the IPS officer, has left some key questions unanswered over procedural aspects of the case. The FIR registered at Rohtak's Urban Estate police station at 3.59 pm on October 6 names Sushil Kumar, an exemptee assistant sub inspector (EASI), deployed with former Rohtak Range IGP Y Puran Kumar, as an accused for demanding a bribe of Rs.2.5 lakh allegedly on behalf of the IPS officer. Less than 24 hours later, Puran Kumar was found dead at his Sector 11 residence in Chandigarh from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Puran Kumar had remained posted as IGP, Rohtak for five months from April to September, 2025 before he was transferred to Police Training College, Sunaria on the night of September 29. Puran Kumar's wife, Amneet in a complaint to Chandigarh Police had alleged that a false FIR was registered at Rohtak on October 6 against Sushil and "under a well-planned conspiracy, her husband was being implicated in the said case by fabricating evidence against him, which pushed him for his final anguish." What came as a surprise was the fact that Rohtak police initially registered the FIR against Sushil Kumar under Section 308 (3) of BNS - which deals with the offence of extortion - instead of invoking provisions of Prevention of Corruption (PC) Act despite the fact that Sushil Kumar, a public servant was accused of demanding bribe allegedly on behalf of Y Puran Kumar. The October 6 FIR was later amended by the cops to incorporate Section 7 of the PC Act, which pertains to offences relating to public servants being bribed, after a disclosure statement was extracted from Sushil Kumar. Legal experts said that the initial choice of registering FIR for the offence of extortion probably was a calculated move to circumvent the procedural requirement of PC Act - Section 17-A which mandated prior approval from the competent authority before investigating a public servant. "Even assuming that prior approval by the competent authority would have been promptly granted for starting investigations against a junior rung personnel, Sushil Kumar, it would still have been extremely difficult for the Rohtak police to extend the scope of investigation to probe Y Puran Kumar without taking prior approval under Section 17-A of the PC Act from the chief minister,'' said an official familiar with the procedural aspects of graft cases. Quoting a recent precedent officials said that a similar procedural gap had led to the collapse of a graft case against IAS officer Jaibir Arya who was in 2023 arrested for his alleged involvement in a corruption case. The state government in September 2025 had declined sanction to prosecute Arya, citing the investigating agency's failure to obtain prior approval under Section 17-A of PC Act before naming him in the FIR and arresting him. Though the investigating agency had insisted that it was a trap case since the agency has electronic evidence establishing the alleged nexus of demand and acceptance of bribe money by Arya in connivance with other accused and thus no prior approval was required, the plea was not accepted by the government. "Registering an extortion case instead of a corruption case amounted to subterfuge," said a Supreme Court lawyer familiar with criminal procedure. "This appears to be a ploy to avoid seeking prior approval - a time-consuming but mandatory process - from the state government to probe an IPS officer," he said. Urban Estate police station SHO Neeraj refused to comment when asked as to why the FIR was initially registered for the offence of extortion and the PC Act was invoked a day later. To a question whether prior approval was granted under Section 17-A, Rohtak SP Surinder Bhoria declined to comment. Narendra Bijarniya who was district police chief when the FIR was registered did not respond to calls and texts for a comment....