Scared of maths, 13-year-old Trombay girl commits suicide

Petrified of faring badly in a maths test at school, a 13-year-old girl committed suicide by hanging herself from the ceiling fan with her mother’s saree the evening before the exam.

Petrified of faring badly in a maths test at school, a 13-year-old girl committed suicide by hanging herself from the ceiling fan with her mother’s saree the evening before the exam.

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Unnati Jeswani, a Class 9 student of BARC school, which is located in the Anushakti Nagar campus in Trombay, left behind a suicide note on Friday, stating that she was frustrated and upset that she could not grasp the subject despite all the effort her parents and she had made.

The incident took place around 5.30pm to 6pm, said Sanjay Khaire, senior inspector, Trombay police station. “The family was performing puja when Unnati closed the door of the adjoining room and hanged herself,” he said.

She lived with her father, an associate foreman at BARC, her mother, a younger sister who studies in Class 7 of the same CBSE school, and grandmother. The teenager was rushed to hospital, where she was declared dead.

A suicide note in Hindi was found on the table in the room. It read: “Main padh padh kar pagal ho gayi hoon. Daddy ne bhi sikhane ki bahut koshish ki lekin main ganit samajh nahin pati. Ganit ke alawa zindagi mein kuch nahin. Main apne maa aur pitaji ko aur sharminda nahin kar sakhti. Main ghutkar nahin jee sakti. Mujhe bhagwan ke paas jana hain… bye mummy bye daddy. [I am losing my mind trying to grasp maths. Daddy also tried to teach me, but I can’t seem to understand it. What will I do with my life if I don’t understand maths. I don’t want to embarrass my parents any more. I can’t continue living like this. I am going to God.]”

The Trombay police have registered a case of accidental death. They will investigate whether Unnati was under a lot of pressure to do well.

Cops to probe if a person or incident provoked teen

While the Trombay police may have registered the suicide of 13-year-old Unnati Jeswani as a case of accidental death, they will investigate whether any particular incident or person provoked the teen over the edge.

An inspector-level officer, will be in charge of the probe.

The police will be recording the statements of the teen’s parents, school teachers, classmates and friends to get insight into her state of mind, said Sanjay Khaire, senior inspector, Trombay police station. “We will try to find out if she was insulted in front of her friends, peers or relatives by anyone, which could have driven her to take such an extreme step.”

If anybody is found to have provoked her, the police can consider registering an abetment to suicide case. “It is too early to comment on the matter. Depending on what we learn during the investigation, appropriate action will be taken,” Khaire said.

Another police officer, on condition of anonymity, said that at a meeting of the school’s Parents Teachers Association (PTA), one of her teachers had told Unnati’s parents that she was not doing well in maths and that she needed to improve.

“She had a maths exam coming up and she was scared as it had been brought to her parents’ notice that she had to do better,” the officer said. “In her suicide note, the girl said she did not want her parents to be embarrassed any further, so we have been talking to her classmates to find out if any teachers publicly humiliated her or said anything to her parents publicly.”