Centre’s Report Cited No Punishment of Rohith

 Hyderabad: The police report on Rohith Vemula's suicide, issued by the Madhapur ACP and investigation officer, was based on a study of the suicide letter, forensic lab reports, caste certificates issued by the Guntur district collector, school certificates and the report of the MHRD ministry-appointed committee headed by Justice Ashok Kumar Rupanwal (retd).

In page 2 of the Justice Rupanwal report, the committee felt that it appeared from the records that the punishment was challenged in the High Court and the matter was pending at the time of Vemula's death. Therefore, the punishment could not be the reason for the suicide.

The university had removed him from the hostel for holding protests and for the alleged assault on ABVP students.

In the final report, the investigation officer forwarded Vemula’s original handwritten copy to the then Vice Chancellor on December 18, 2015, to forensic lab experts to compare with the suicide note written by the PhD scholar. P. Rajini, assistant director, FSL, Hyderabad, established that handwriting on the both letter the letters were by the same person.

The investigation officer said that they had approached the Jalagam Rama Rao Memorial Municipal School in Guntur seeking records pertaining to Radhika, who pursued her schooling from 1981 to 1985. It was found in her school records that she belonged to the Vaddera community.

On Friday, Justice E.V. Venu Gopal of the Telangana High Court closed a bunch of five quash proceedings related to the Rohith Vemula suicide issue. The array of accused, who had moved the court to quash the cases against them, included the then VC of University of Hyderabad Podile Appa Rao, N. Susheel Kumar, Krishna Chaianya Yellapragada, N. Diwakar, senior counsel N. Ramachander Rao and another. The judge took on file the report of the prosecution that the allegations against the accused were a case of lack of evidence.