JNU Dalit scholar from Tamil Nadu ends life

Chennai: Muthukrishnan Jeevanantham, a Dalit scholar at the prestigious JNU in New Delhi from Tamil Nadu who was part of the Justice for Rohith Vemula movement at the University of Hyderabad, allegedly committed suicide at his friend’s apartment on Monday evening.

Jeevanantham, 25, who called himself Rajini Krish, died due to depression and he had written a poignant post on Facebook just three days ago, where he talked in detail about “no equality” in M. Phil and PhD admission.

“When equality is denied everything is denied,” he had ended the post on his Facebook page. Delhi police said Mr Jeevenantham, who was pursuing PhD at the JNU, was found hanging from the ceiling fan at his friend’s apartment in South Delhi’s Munirka area.

Quoting his friends, the Delhi police said Mr Jeevanathanam had lunch along with his friends on Monday afternoon after Holi celebrations and locked himself in a room on the pretext of sleeping. “When he did not come out for a long time, his friends banged the door and found him hanging,” the police said, adding that no suicide note has been found so far from him.

“He is said to have been depressed for some time over some personal issues,” a senior police official said. Jeevanantham is an alumnus of University of Hyderabad and was part of the Rohith Vemula movement in UoH.