Andhra govt forms committee to probe minor girl student’s suicide in Vizag

Visakhapatnam: Andhra Pradesh government has formed a committee to probe the suicide of a minor girl student here, who alleged she was sexually harassed, an official said on Tuesday.

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

The 17-year-old girl ended her life by jumping to death from a building in the intervening night of March 28 and 29, alleging that some unidentified persons had threatened to post her objectionable pictures on social media.

“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 are also being enquired by the police and two staff members were also detained.

In the wake of the suicide at the polytechnic college, police are continuing the probe and are yet to make any headway in identifying the culprits who allegedly abetted her suicide.

Visakhapatnam North assistant commissioner of police (ACP) B Sunil said Police are yet to find any concrete evidence on the allegations made by the deceased student.

“Till now we haven’t got any clue. Our technical team is searching all the technical data and analysing data with professionals,” Sunil told PTI, adding the mobile phones of the student and others have been taken for examination.

Sunil said police are questioning the management of the college, the student’s friends, roommates, parents, regular contacts and suspects to unearth the truth.

However, the ACP noted the girl was not raped and police are yet to find evidence of molestation or any abusive messages, comments, photographs, discussions and others.

He said the final post-mortem report is awaited while police registered a case under IPC Sections 354 A and C and 305, including invoking the Ragging Act.

Moreover, officials noted the student of the private college was a bit irregular, and are also contemplating a probe on her psychological state as well.

Inputs from PTI