Dmitry Rudov, 39, was hospitalized with severe burns in the southern Urals republic of Bashkortostan after setting himself on fire outside Ishimbay's City Hall on Monday. Reports say the electrical engineer had written a letter appealing to President Vladimir Putin last month after he was fired from a local Gazprom subsidiary company.

A man has died after setting himself on fire in front of a government building in southern Russia, reportedly after being fired from his company.

Eyewitnesses reportedly heard Rudov screaming “corruption” while pouring gasoline over himself in front of the government building, the Meduza news website reported.

In his December appeal to Putin, Rudov complained of severe pain, loss of consciousness and an inability to secure disability benefits.

“I hope to survive until your elections without medication,” he wrote in the letter carried by the Pravo.media legal portal.

Regional investigators opened a criminal case on charges of incitement to suicide over information that Rudov was in a legal dispute with his supervisor and had gone through a divorce in 2017, the Bashkortostan investigative committee said in a statement Tuesday.