A 19-year-old National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) aspirant who was found dead in his home in Tamil Nadu's Ariyalur district on Wednesday, 9 September, is said to have died by suicide according to the local police. His body was found in a well in his village, about 300 kilometres from Chennai.
This comes in the backdrop of demands in the state, and across the country, for the exam to be postponed till the end of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.
According to the police, the student, named Vignesh, had already appeared for the exam twice.
"The youth has not left any suicide note. His parents say he appeared stressed, we are investigating what triggered to kill himself. He had not cleared NEET in his earlier attempts," said Ariyalur SP VR Srinivasan to NDTV.
Reacting to the incident, DMK Chief MK Stalin, who is in the opposition in the state, slammed the central government.
"When will the merciless central government stop the NEET. How many more lives should we lose?" he said.
"The central government has been saying that NEET is to upgrade the standard of medical education and prevent commercialisation. If it is true that the quality of medical education has been rising, many who scored much less than Vignesh in NEET must not have been allowed to join private medical colleges by pumping in loads of money," said PMK leader S Ramadoss.
Meanwhile, the villagers in Ariyalur are staging protests.
Several non-BJP ruled states have asked for the entrance exam to be postponed this year due to the rising number of COVID cases. The Supreme Court had earlier turned down a plea by several states to postpone the exam.
Tamil Nadu Chief Minister E Palaniswami has announced a compensation of 7 lakh rupees for the family.
(With inputs from NDTV)
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