Suicide over exam: Death throws up questions

“God knows what came to her that she took a step as drastic as this. She was very depressed when she returned home yesterday. Her re-test had not gone off well. Then she went to her room to lie down, but nobody thought that she would end her life like this,” said her aunt Madhu Arora. Prachi stayed with her aunt in Ghaziabad for a year before she moved back with her parents last year.

According to school principal R.K. Sharma, Prachi had joined the school only last year and she was not a very bright student. Said Sharma, “In fact, she had failed in three subjects — science, social studies and Hindi — this year and she was appearing for the re-tests that are being held to give another chance to all such students. She had already appeared for her science and yesterday was her social studies paper.”

She was caught exchanging sheets with another classmate. And therefore her parents were summoned to the school and a warning issued to her and the other student. “As a rule we always get the parents to deal with the child in these situations. So we spoke with her mother and after a warning we told them that the re-test now stood cancelled and that she must take her next re-test as the decision to re-conduct the exam will be taken later. But nowhere did we say that she had flunked or make an announcement of the results,” said Sharma.

An exercise which they conducted on the other girl as well. Said Neeta, who was caught exchanging papers with her, “I didn’t know Prachi well. We were caught exchanging sheets as we just wanted to clear our papers. But I never saw her after we were caught. My father was also summoned and I was given a warning and asked to sit for the next paper. Which I did.” Neeta confessed that she too had contemplated ending her life, but then decided against it. “I love my parents,” she said.

According to her classmates, Prachi had only one close friend in the class. Though she used to talk to others, she rarely shared her `secrets’ with her friends. “She was a very well mannered girl. For instance, she used to talk to me over the phone for hours, and yet she would apologise for taking so much of my time,” said her classmate, Sonia. Said her class teacher, Indira Vaid, “She was a very pretty and soft-spoken girl. But one thing which always struck to me about her was that she would never answer back or give an explanation for anything. She would look so nervous that one just let her be.”

According to Deepa, her only close friend in the class, “Prachi was a very different child at home. She was really loved and pampered at home. And she would often talk about her lots of cousins. However, she always had this fear of not being able to face her teachers and other students after flunking in the class.”

According to noted psychiatrist Achal Bhagat, who also runs a helpline for the students, the present-age children are most affected by the loss of face in the society and all for a few marks. “These children don’t want to talk to their friends. From their parents they fear rejection and rebuke. And teachers simply don’t have any time. So where do they go?”

Bhagat said that there was a need to involve the parents in the education system and empower them accordingly. So that they could help their children redefine success. And this success need not be academic success but the one that boosts their individual creativity.

Some names have been changed to protect their identity.