Engineering student dies by suicide in Kota, third incident in a week

A final year BTech student allegedly committed suicide by hanging from a ceiling fan in his paying guest room in Rajasthan’s Kota, police said on Friday.

Noor Mohammed (27) took the extreme step sometime on Wednesday but his body was recovered from his room in Vigyan Nagar area on Thursday night. No suicide note was recovered, they said.

This is the third suicide reported from Kota in two weeks.

A native of Uttar Pradesh’s Gonda, Mohammed was pursuing a BTech degree from SRM University, Chennai and lived as a paying guest here.

DSP (Vigyan Nagar) Dharmveer Singh said Mohammed studied in coaching institutes in Kota to prepare for the entrance exam from 2016 to 2019 and after being admitted to SRM University, he used to take online classes from his Kota PG.

He likely committed suicide by hanging himself from a ceiling fan using a bed sheet on Wednesday. A mess boy noticed a tiffin box kept untouched outside Mohammed’s room on Thursday evening and informed the PG owner, the officer said. The police were informed about the incident at around 8 pm on Thursday, Singh said.

The body has been placed in the mortuary for post-mortem, he said, adding that the student’s family has been informed and they are on their way to Kota.

So far three suicides have been reported in Kota this year. On January 29, 18-year-old Niharika Singh preparing for JEE allegedly hanged herself at her home in this coaching hub, leaving behind a suicide note saying sorry to her parents and calling herself a “loser”.

On January 23, 19-year-old Mohammed Zaid was found hanging in his hostel room in Kota.

He had come to the city from Uttar Pradesh’s Moradabad district a year back to prepare for the medical entrance exam NEET. No suicide note was found in that case.

Last year, 26 students allegedly committed suicide in Kota, where children come from across the country to prepare for competitive tests like the National Entrance Exam (JEE) for admission to top engineering colleges.