Visakhapatnam minor suicide: Five arrested; NHRC sends notice to Andhra government, DGP

Police investigation

Visakhapatnam North Assistant Commissioner of Police (ACP) B Sunil told PTI that the initial investigation pointed to Rao as the person who allegedly sexually harassed the deceased student.

“Shankar Rao is not admitting but in our investigation, all the girls have pointed the finger at him. The girl’s close friends have also said that. He will be interrogated further,” said Sunil.

The arrested persons were booked under IPC Sections 305, 354 A, 354 C, 506, Section 12 of POCSO Act and other sections under the Prohibition of Ragging Act.

The ACP said that the five accused will be produced in front of a judge today.

Earlier, C Nagarani, Director, Technical Education, Andhra Pradesh said she has formed a committee to probe the incident and its report is awaited.

“A deeper enquiry is going on over the incident with some persons being summoned to the police station on a daily basis,” Nagarani told PTI.

According to Nagarani, five of the student’s seven teachers were women and the remaining two were men, including the principal of the college and an engineering drawing teacher.

Further, she said the lab assistants were also being enquired by the police.

Police have questioned the college management, the student’s friends, roommates, parents, regular contacts and suspects.

The ACP did clarify that the girl was not raped, though a final post-mortem report is awaited.

Also Read: Visakhapatnam student’s texts to kin before suicide points to sexual harassment in college

NHRC notice

The NHRC has issued a notice to the Andhra Pradesh government and the state’s police chief, officials said on Tuesday.

The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) in a statement has observed that apparently, the “negligent and reckless attitude of the authorities” of the institution has led to this incident.

The NHRC has taken suo motu cognisance of a media report that “unable to bear the sexual harassment by a faculty member, a first-year diploma student committed suicide by jumping from the fourth floor of Chaitanya Engineering College in Kommadi area, Visakhapatnam district, Andhra Pradesh on 28 March”, it said.

Reportedly, in a message to her father on his mobile-phone, she had said alleged that sexual harassment of girl students is “common in the college and the management was not able to stop it”, the statement said.

The commission has observed that the content of the news report, if true, raise a serious issue of violation of human rights and it is a matter of concern.

The NHRC said that accordingly, it has issued notices to the chief secretary and the director general of police of Andhra Pradesh, seeking a detailed report in four weeks. It should also include the status of the investigation, the rights panel said.

Also, allegations of sexual harassment of other students in the college, require to be “investigated thoroughly” so that the perpetrators are booked and such incidents of violation of the right to life and dignity do not recur, it said.

The incident

The family of the first-year diploma student, residing in the neighbouring Anakapalle district of Andhra Pradesh, received a call from the institute’s authorities around 9 pm on 28 March, informing them that she had gone missing.

Upon her prolonged unresponsiveness to calls, the family informed the police. She reportedly left her room around 11:50 pm on 28 March.

She went to the terrace of her hostel building and allegedly jumped down from there at around 1:05 am on Friday.

The messages sent by the teenager to her family — which were accessed by South First — before she allegedly jumped from her hostel building, hinted at the involvement of faculty.

“All of you take care, I miss you all so much. The reason for me to commit suicide is because of the sexual harassment going on in this college. You may ask me to report this to the faculty. But if one among the faculty is involved in this, how would we tell them Nanna (father)? They are behaving very badly; they even took my pictures and are blackmailing me. The faculty has to warn the students, but the same faculty members are encouraging them,” the message notes.

She further stated, “This is happening to not just me but many others in the college. They are threatening us of uploading the pictures on social media if we approach the police.”

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(With PTI inputs)