The dream of Balusamy (46) a lorry driver and his wife Sakunthala (37) a daily labourer, of Pudupatti village near Rasipuram in Namakkal District, to see the first graduate of their family was shattered as their elder son Karthikeyan (21) died on Wednesday morning.
His relatives said that he was the first among his cousins to take up professional education.
“There are many engineering colleges in Namakkal. We sent him here (Coimbatore) for better exposure to studies,” Sakunthala said. “We never expected to miss him forever,” she added.
Balusamy was driving a truck at Ahmedabad on Tuesday morning when he was informed that his son was hospitalised following an accident. He hired a taxi and rushed here only to see his son unconscious. The victim’s cousin P. Sundararajan (26) said that the boy could not recognise anyone.
Another relative N. Prabhu (24) said that the Karthikeyan wanted to serve the nation by joining the Armed Forces and also support his family. He said that Karthikeyan had classes only till the end of this week. “After Pongal he had to do his project before appearing for the final examinations,” he added.
The grieving family wondered why they were informed by the college authorities four hours after the murderous attack on Karthikeyan.
Karthikeyan’s brother Dinesh (19) is a second year civil engineering student studying in a private college in Chennai. The death of their elder son has forced the family consider discontinuing their younger son’s education and enrolling him in an institution in Namakkal from the next academic year.
