Police arrest three lecturers in Richa Mishra suicide case

Bhubaneswar, Jul 13 (UNI) The city police today arrested three lecturers of BJB College here in connection with the famous Richa Mishra suicide case.

The three lecturers were arrested after they came out from a marathon deposition before the Commission of Departmental Inquiries conducted by Senior Bureaucrats Nalini Mohanty on the direction of the state government.

Richa Mishra, a third-year Commerce student of the BJB College had committed suicide on November 18 last by hanging herself from the ceiling fan. She however, had left a suicide note stating that she was taking the extreme step because she could not tolerate the harassment meted out to her by three lecturers of the college.

The girl named Durga Prasad Mishra, Sahadev Swain and Ananga Mohapatra in her suicide note which prompted her father Prasanna Kumar Mishra, a professor in the Orissa University of Agriculture and Technology (OUAT) to lodge a FIR in the city police station.

The incident sent shockwaves in the state capital with the students coming to the street, demanding action against the three lecturers. The girl in her suicide note also alleged that she was given less marks by the lecturers as she refused to take tuition under them.

The government suspended the three lecturers after the Director of Higher Education, who conducted an inquiry into the incident found prima facie evidence in the case and recommended action against the three lecturers.

The papers of Richa Mishra were also reevaluated by a team of professors who pointed out the discrepancies in the marks given to her by the two lecturers as alleged by the girl in her suicide note.

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