Ragging victim falls from 4th floor, dies of injuries at SMS Hospital

TNN Sep 10, 2011, 03.15am IST

JAIPUR: A 19-year-old girl was allegedly ragged by her seniors at a private engineering college at Bhankrota here. This caused her to fall from the fourth floor of her college hostel and she died in SMS Hospital on Thursday night. Her father has lodged an FIR alleging the college authorities were attempting to hush up the matter. However, the police claimed they were waiting the postmortem report.

A resident of Patna, Somya Singh was a first year B-Tech student at the Rajasthan College of Engineering for Women, Bhankrota on Jaipur-Ajmer Highway in Jaipur district.

"Her father, Mithilesh Kumar Singh, has lodged an FIR saying two senior girls had forced her to walk on the fourth floor railing of her hostel twice within three days. Singh claimed that his daughter fell during the second attempt," said Sharad Kaviraj, DCP (West).

However, chief hostel warden Shalini Jain claimed no family member had complained about the ragging in the past. "No ragging took place in the hostel," she added.

As per the FIR, two senior girls barged into her hostel room on September 3 and said she would be ragged as she was a new student. Somya had joined the college on August 26.

"She was made to walk on the railing by the seniors. She got scared and called up her aunt and brother living in Jaipur and the father who lives in Patna. Somya also informed the hostel warden Manju, her younger sister Tulika, brother Sushil and a senior girl of the college Tapsi," the FIR says.

The FIR further says her aunt came to the hostel on September 4 and tried to contact Manju, but she was told that she is on leave. "The aunt then complained to someone about the ragging," the FIR states.

It has also been alleged in the FIR that the two unidentified senior girls again came to the hostel room on September 6 and made her walk on the railing. This time she fell and lay on the ground for half an hour.

The girl's father Mithilesh Singh told TOI that while her injured daughter was rushed to the hospital, a college teacher threatened Somya's sister Tulika and told her not to complain about ragging.

"Tulika was threatened that she and her sister will study in the college for four years suggesting that their future will be ruined," the father alleged.

DCP Sharad Kaviraj said, "A postmortem has been conducted and the report is expected on Saturday."

Family members alleged that in the past three days since Somya fell from the fourth floor of the hostel, police have neither done any investigation nor record statements of the college authorities concerned.