Kota: 2 NEET aspirants commit suicide in a day, 22 this year

KOTA: Within four hours, two NEET aspirants allegedly committed suicide in two separate incidents in Rajasthan’s Kota on Sunday, taking the total toll to 22 this year, police said. Avishkar Shambaji Kasle (17), jumped from the sixth floor of his coaching institute's building in Jawahar Nagar at around 3.15 pm, minutes after walking out of a room on the third floor of the institute after taking a test, they added.

The institute’s staff rushed Kasle to a hospital but he succumbed on the way, Vigyan Nagar Circle Officer (CO) Dharmveer Singh said. Four hours after Kasle’s death, 18-year-old Adarsh Raj, who was also preparing for the competitive exam, hanged himself in his rented flat in under Kunhadi police station area at around 7 pm, police said. When the teen’s sister and cousin brother reached the flat around 7.30, they broke open his room, which was locked from the inside, and found Raj hanging from the ceiling, Circle Officer (Kunhadi) KS Rathore said Raj was reportedly breathing when he was taken down but succumbed on the way to hospital, he said.

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A native of Maharashtra's Latur district and a Class 12 student, Kasle was preparing for NEET UG in the city for three years and was living in a rented room in the Talwandi area with his maternal grandparents, CO Singh said, adding that his parents are government school teachers in Maharashtra. Raj, a native of Bihar’s Rohtas district, had been preparing for NEET UG in a coaching institute in Kota for a year and was living in a rented 2BHK flat with his sister and cousin brother, who are also preparing for competitive exams, police said. According to police, no suicide notes were recovered from either of the students’ rooms. Kasle took a routine test in the noon session on the third floor of the coaching institute and jumped from the sixth floor of the building -- onto around 72 feet down in the backyard -- immediately after giving the test, Vigyan Nagar CO said.

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The spiral stairs of the building were not covered and it would be investigated how the teen climbed to the sixth floor amid the presence of staff and other students, he said. The reason behind Kasle’s suicide is likely to be his low marks in the routine tests at the institute as he was scoring well earlier but dropped from 575 marks to 288 marks in the last routine test, CO Singh said. Raj, who also took a routine test at his coaching institute in Kunhadi police station area limits in the noon session on Sunday, was reportedly scoring low marks in the tests and was upset over the same, ASP (Kota city) Bhagwat Singh Hingad said while speaking to media in the mortuary of MBS hospital, where the 18-year-old’s body was placed for post-mortem.

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The post-mortem of both the bodies will be conducted on Monday after the arrival of their parents, police said. The suicides of Kasle and Raj have taken the total toll of suicides by coaching students in Kota to six this month and 22 this year alone. Fifteen coaching students died by suicide last year in the coaching hub, where around 3 laks students from across the country are currently preparing for various competitive exams in different institutes of the city.