Chennai News: A 27-year-old finance influencer with 1.3 million followers on Instagram died by suicide allegedly due to cyberbullying by another influencer of the same niche. V Harish, the deceased, was found hanging at his rented villa in Chennai on Tuesday. His father stated that Harish was distressed over repeated deletion of his accounts, adding that he was cyberbullied by Jason Samuel, another influencer.
'Was distressed Over Account Deletion'
In its statement, police stated that Harish was distressed after two of his main accounts got deleted recently. The officials added that while he tried to make a fresh account, it was also deleted later amid the forgery allegations. As per his father, Samuel published multiple videos on October 18 alleging that Harish was a fraud and misleading the public. In a video that Harish recorded before his death, he blamed Samuel for this harsh step.
What Jason Samuel Said?
While reacting to the news, Jason stated that he was shocked and saddened over Harish's death, claiming that he never cyber-bullied him. However, the accused accepted that he pointed out his lack of authority and asked him to make content with a proper license.
"I am deeply saddened, heavily grieving, shocked and frozen at what has happened and I mourn the loss of life. I have not cyber-bullied him. I pointed out his lack of licence and authority, misrepresentation of licence and fraud on SEBI and AMFI where he has not got SEBI RIA for his work and misrepresented that he had an AMFI license when he got the ARN only recently. i.e., his illegal activity," Samuel wrote.
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"I literally asked him in the video to come back and do this with a proper SEBI licence. I never intended or expected this drastic measure to happen and I mourn the loss," he added. Kanathur police have registered a case of unnatural death and have launched a probe.
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