Arjun holds younger brother Ashutosh in his lap as their mother Sushmita (face covered) breaks down in the restaurant where DCP Sanjay Banerjee shot himself during a family lunch on Saturday.

Thane police commissioner KP Raghuvanshi speaks to Sushmita as Arjun, 14, looks on.

The table at a Thane restaurant where the family was having lunch. (Fotocorp pictures)

DCP Sanjay Banerjee

Mumbai, March 23: A deputy commissioner of police heading the technical cell of the Maharashtra anti-terrorism squad shot himself in the head in a Thane restaurant today in front of his wife and two sons.

Thane police sources said Sanjay Banerjee, 47, was having lunch with wife Sushmita, and sons Arjun, 14, and Ashutosh, 9, at Goa Portuguesa when he pulled out his service revolver and turned it on himself around 3.05pm. He was rushed to Thane civil hospital where he was declared dead on admission.

His body was moved to Sir JJ Hospital in central Mumbai in the evening for a post-mortem.

Police sources said the reason for the suicide was unclear but a domestic dispute and work-related stress were being investigated as possible causes.

V.B. More, the assistant commissioner of police, Zone V, Thane police, said: “We are yet to record statements of the family, who are in a state of shock. We have yet to speak to waiters in the restaurant. But initial inquiries revealed the waiters were busy serving and did not appear to have witnessed the shooting.”

Although Banerjee worked at the heavily guarded state ATS headquarters in Byculla in central Mumbai, his family stayed in a flat at the upscale Hiranandani Estate in Thane, a five-minute drive from the restaurant.

The sources said Banerjee’s older son Arjun studied in a boarding school in Panchgani and had just come home for the summer vacations.

Thane police commissioner K.P. Raghuvanshi and state ATS chief Rakesh Maria, the direct superior of Banerjee, visited the spot but were unavailable for comment.

Karan Dev, a manager of Goa Portuguesa, told The Telegraph: “I was called to the restaurant after the incident. My staff told me nothing unusual was noticed when they were having lunch. The family ordered food and was served the order. They were still finishing the food when the incident happened. Our staff did not notice any quarrel or argument at the table.”

Dev said the restaurant was empty as it was a newly opened branch of the Mumbai eatery famous for Goan fish specialities. Police sources claimed Banerjee had a drink before lunch but Dev denied he had ordered alcohol.

A BE in electrical engineering from Pune, Banerjee was a 1996-batch state police service officer. “His family belonged to Nagpur. Sanjay married an Indian Airlines official’s daughter,” said a police officer who was their neighbour in Yashodhan, a police staff quarters building in Mumbai.

Banerjee joined Maharashtra police as deputy superintendent, Nanded, in 1996. He served as sub-divisional police officer in Nanded, assistant commissioner of police, traffic, Thane police, before he was promoted as superintendent of police in 2006.

He was then posted at the Police Training Academy in Nashik. In 2009, he was posted as deputy commissioner of Zone 11 in Mumbai police. In June 2012, he was posted as superintendent, technical cell, of the state anti terrorism squad.

His name hit the headlines in 2010 when former Mumbai commissioner Julio Ribeiro wrote to state home minister R.R. Patil terming him one of four police officers allegedly given prime postings in Mumbai with help from politicians.