Expelled Dalit Scholar Kills himself in University of Hyderabad!!

In a tragic incident, Rohith Vemula, one of the five dalit scholars expelled by the University of Hyderabad (UoH) last year, committed suicide on Sunday by hanging himself at a hostel.

          

Rohith, 25, a resident of Guntur, was doing his PhD in science technology and society studies for the past two years, before the scholar allegedly got involved in a tiff between two student groups in August last year. The UoH administration ordered a probe and the final decision by the proctorial board led to the expulsion of Rohith along with four others.

The death shocked students and the wider academic community and was squarely blamed on a clash the students, belonging to the the Ambedkar Students’ Association (ASA) had with the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad, the student wing of the BJP, last year.

The following is the text of the Rohit’s letter:

“Good morning,

I would not be around when you read this letter. Don’t get angry on me. I know some of you truly cared for me, loved me and treated me very well. I have no complaints on anyone. It was always with myself I had problems. I feel a growing gap between my soul and my body. And I have become a monster. I always wanted to be a writer. A writer of science, like Carl Sagan. At last, this is the only letter I am getting to write.

I loved Science, Stars, Nature, but then I loved people without knowing that people have long since divorced from nature. Our feelings are second handed. Our love is constructed. Our beliefs colored. Our originality valid through artificial art. It has become truly difficult to love without getting hurt.

The value of a man was reduced to his immediate identity and nearest possibility. To a vote. To a number. To a thing. Never was a man treated as a mind. As a glorious thing made up of star dust. In very field, in studies, in streets, in politics, and in dying and living.

I am writing this kind of letter for the first time. My first time of a final letter. Forgive me if I fail to make sense.

Maybe I was wrong, all the while, in understanding world. In understanding love, pain, life, death. There was no urgency. But I always was rushing. Desperate to start a life. All the while, some people, for them, life itself is curse. My birth is my fatal accident. I can never recover from my childhood loneliness. The unappreciated child from my past.

I am not hurt at this moment. I am not sad. I am just empty. Unconcerned about myself. That’s pathetic. And that’s why I am doing this.

People may dub me as a coward. And selfish, or stupid once I am gone. I am not bothered about what I am called. I don’t believe in after-death stories, ghosts, or spirits. If there is anything at all I believe, I believe that I can travel to the stars. And know about the other worlds.

If you, who is reading this letter can do anything for me, I have to get 7 months of my fellowship, one lakh and seventy five thousand rupees. Please see to it that my family is paid that. I have to give some 40 thousand to Ramji. He never asked them back. But please pay that to him from that.

Let my funeral be silent and smooth. Behave like I just appeared and gone. Do not shed tears for me. Know that I am happy dead than being alive.

“From shadows to the stars.”

Uma anna, sorry for using your room for this thing.

To ASA family, sorry for disappointing all of you. You loved me very much. I wish all the very best for the future.

For one last time,

      Jai Bheem

I forgot to write the formalities. No one is responsible for my this act of killing myself.

No one has instigated me, whether by their acts or by their words to this act.

This is my decision and I am the only one responsible for this.

Do not trouble my friends and enemies on this after I am gone.”

As news spread of his death, hundreds gathered at the university and social media was flooded with quotes from his suicide note, where he wrote in great detail about his dreams of becoming a writer and scientist. He also alleged that he hadn’t received his fellowship money for several months.

The Joint Action Committee of various student groups, which has intensified its agitation against the expulsion following Vemula's death, have blamed Rao and Dattatreya for the incident. They have demanded their resignations.
 Dattatreya, Union minister of state for labour (independent charge) in the central government, had written a letter to human resource development minister late last year, complaining about caste politics playing out on the varsity campus.

Apart from Dattatreya and Podile (accused 1 and 2), the case has also been filed against local BJP MLC N Ramchander Rao, and two ABVP leaders - Sushil Kumar and Krishna Chaitanya (accused no 4 and 5). They five were also charged under the SC and ST Atrocities Act.