Medico suicide case: 5 AIIMS Rajkot students arrested; 17-page note alleges assault by batchmates

RAJKOT: Five final-year MBBS students of the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) Rajkot have been arrested on charges of abetment to suicide after one of their classmates, Ratan Kumar Meghwal (26), died by suicide on Saturday. The case was registered at Gandhigram police station in Rajkot following a complaint by the victim's father. The accused have been sent to judicial custody, police said.

They have been booked under Section 108 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) along with relevant provisions of the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989.

The investigation has been handed over to ACP Chintan Patel of the SC/ST Cell. "All five accused, who are classmates of the deceased, have been arrested and their statements are being recorded. They were produced before the court, which sent them to judicial custody," said Patel. He added that three of the accused were from Rajasthan, one from Haryana and one from Bharuch in Gujarat.

According to police, Ratan died by suicide in the early hours of March 14 after coming under a train near Ghanteshwar on Jamnagar Road in Rajkot. Railway police recovered his bag from the spot, which contained a mobile phone, a tablet and a notebook.

In the 17-page note, written in Hindi and English, found in the notebook, Ratan allegedly accused several fellow students of physically assaulting and mentally harassing him since Jan over suspicions regarding his relationship with a girl. The note also mentioned an alleged incident of harassment on Jan 27 and requested that it be treated as his "dying declaration".

Based on a complaint filed by Mohanlal Meghwal, father of 26-year-old Ratan and a native of Phalsund village in Rajasthan's Jaisalmer district, police arrested Pranav Paliwal, Asmit Sharma, Ayush Yadav, Nirvighnam Noor and Yuvraj Chaudhary.

In his complaint, Mohanlal Meghwal alleged that continuous harassment by the accused had mentally broken his son and ultimately pushed him to take the extreme step.

Police sources said Ratan had earlier attempted suicide in Jan after leaving the AIIMS hostel with a note in which he had reportedly mentioned the same students. At that time, he was rescued near railway tracks and later taken home to Rajasthan by his family. He had recently returned to Rajkot to appear for his final-year MBBS examinations. However, instead of going to the hostel, he went towards the railway tracks where he allegedly ended his life.

When asked why no action was initiated against the accused in January when Ratan had named them in his note, police sources said that since Ratan's family did not file a formal complaint, no case was registered and the accused were not summoned for questioning.

Accused to appear for final exams
All five accused, who are in the final year of the MBBS course, pleaded before the magisterial court to allow them to appear for the final examinations, which begin on Monday. Sources said the court granted them permission to appear for the exams under police custody.