VNIT student, who wanted to study law, found hanging

Nagpur: Manojkumar Suryanarayana, 19, first year student of BTech in mining at VNIT, was found hanging from ceiling fan with a bedsheet at his hostel room on Wednesday.

Though the police have not found suicide note, it is believed that the student was depressed over his poor academic performance. Manojkumar had failed in six subjects, but he had promised family members to work hard to clear it, it was learnt. It was also learnt that Manojkumar wanted to study law and not engineering.

The student had appeared for an exam on Monday, though he left the exam hall very soon. Sources said that Manojkumar had used his cell phone to order food online on Tuesday night, but it was not delivered. It was the last time some of the hostel mates had seen him.

His mother, working at a school, had called him several times on Wednesday, but there was no response. The family members felt something was amiss as Manojkumar did not wish his cousin on her birthday, which was quite unusual. The family members then alerted VNIT authorities who, after not getting any response from Manojkumar’s room, informed Bajaj Nagar police. The police broke open the room door only to find the student hanging.

The police performed panchnama and sent the body for post-mortem. What has baffled the police more is that Manojkumar’s mobile was not found in the room.

An official from Bajaj Nagar police station said Manojkumar’s mobile number has been referred to cyber cell for tracking. “Prima facie, it seems to be a case of wrong academic choice. Those who were close to Manojkumar said that he wanted to study law and not engineering.”

“Fellow students revealed that Manojkumar had left the exam hall very soon on Tuesday,” said a police source who visited the spot.

Manojkumar was a native of Korba in Chhattisgarh. He was the youngest of three siblings. One of his elder sister is studying medicine, while another is postgraduate in physics.

“Manojkumar was the last person to contemplate ending life. We had seen him studying even at his sister’s marriage a couple of months ago,” said a cousin, rejecting the suicide theory. “We used to cheer him up whenever the topic of his backlog subjects would come up,” she said.

A case of accidental death has been registered at Bajaj Nagar police station.