Shamnad Basheer may have died of suffocation: Police

A day after legal scholar Shamnad Basheer was found dead in his car in Karnataka, police on Monday said he may have died due to suffocation, discounting the possibility of any foul play.

Basheer, an alumnus of the National Law School of India University here and the Oxford University, was found dead by police in his car in an open area, a short distance from the road, on the outskirts of the district headquarters town of Chikkamagaluru on Thursday.

"He had parked and locked his car from inside and the cause of death is either suffocation or carbon monoxide poisoning because he must have switched on his heater, because after some time it led to short-circuit," Chikkamagaluru Superintendent of Police Harish Pandey told PTI.

The police are waiting for the autopsy report to determine the cause of the death of the 43-year-old, the founder of Increased Divesity by Increasing Access to Legal Education, an NGO serving to make legal education accessible to underprivileged children.

He was also a specialist in Intellectual Property law. Basheer, a recipient of the Infosys Science Foundation prize and also known for his contributions in reforms in and spreading of legal education, was reportedly missing for the past three to four days.

Police had launched a vigorous search on Thursday after his family members lodged a missing complaint.