11 - 15th January 2006 - IIT Kgp boy kills self over failed affair - Source-TOI

TNN, Jan 15, 2006, 01.45am IST
KOLKATA: Dhiraj Kumar Anand, a II-year student of IITKharagpur's mining department, hung himself from the ceiling fan of his hostel room on Friday evening. Police said he committed suicide after a failed love affair.

A suicide note said Dhiraj was depressed as his love had not been reciprocated. Police found lines written on the walls in his room expressing his love for the girl.

Dhiraj had performed well in his first-year exams. He was said to be soft spoken, friendly and religious-minded. "He did not seem depressed.

The question of study and exam stress does not arise as he was a very good student," IIT-Kharagpur director S K Dubey said. Dhiraj last attended classes on January 12. No one at the IIT saw him after he retired to his room that night.

There was no class for the students of his department the next morning, so he was not missed till much later. The door was locked throughout the day. When he was not seen till late afternoon, his friends knocked on his door.

When there was no response, they got in touch with the hostel authorities who informed the police station located on campus.

This is the second suicide at IIT-Kharagpur in less than two years. In April 2004, Nishith Karwa was found hanging from the window grill of his room

2-15th April 2004 - IIT student was murdered'

TNN, Apr 15, 2004, 04.57pm IST

KOLKATA: Third year electronics engineering student from IIT Kharagpur, Nishit Karwa did not commit suicide on Monday but was murdered, alleged his father, HP Karwa. Newspaper reports said that Nishit was found hanging in his hostel room (C-215 of Nehru Hall) on Tuesday.

The institute and the police have both said that Nishit had committed suicide because he was depressed from an "affair" that he was having with a girl from the city.

Karwa called a press conference on Thursday to complain that the institute was trying to hush up the issue by calling it a suicide when all the clues at the campus pointed at murder. "I demand justice. I want a high level inquiry. They just cannot shut it up by putting the blame of suicide on my son's shoulders!" a weeping Karwa told reporters, adding that Nishit was his only son.

Karwa stressed that Nishit was a brilliant student who scored 99 per cent marks in his CBSE XII examination. In IIT Kharagpur too he was known for his academic prowess and was specially interested in robotics that won him the coveted first prize in Yantriki (robotics) competition amongst all IITs. He was also a promising guitar player and won the gold medal in the institute's own music competition this year.

"The institute showed me print-outs of a chat session of Nishit and the girl in question. I know about this girl because she was Nishit's friend. He had no special relationship with her and the print outs clearly show that these were friendly messages. There's nothing to prove that they were in love etc. Moreover, would never have minded if Nishit got himself a girlfriend or wanted to marry someone," Karwa emphasised.

In his effort to establish the murder Karwa said, "I was shown an iron grill from where Nishit had hanged himself. The grill is situated at about the same height as my son's, who was six feet tall. The room also has a fan, why didn't he hang himself from there?" asked Karwa.

"Moreover, I got to know from some of his friends that the door was not locked from inside when the body was discovered," Karwa added.

Karwa complained that he was not allowed to see the body of his son before it was sent for postmortem, though he was present there. "I demanded that a medical board be set up, but to no avail. The institute authorities told me that a doctor was being sent from Midnapur town. But when I tried to meet him I was told, he has already left," Karwa added.

He quashed the theory that Nishit was depressed. "You can ask any of his friends in the institute or in IIT Powai and Delhi where he was equally popular, as to how happy a person he was," Karwa challenged adding that theirs was an affluent family and financial problems also did not worry Nishit.

Karwa also complained that the death certificate of the boy has not been handed over to him. He however revealed that Nishit's relation had strained with his music group of late.

IIT Kharagpur director, S.K. Dubey reacted sharply at the blame that the institute is trying to hush up the case, "why should we? We have handed the matter to the police for investigation and the institute is extending all its support. Even we need to know what went wrong. The door of the boy's room was locked from inside and had to be broken open, this has been established."