The Jawaharlal Nehru University student who was found dead inside the varsity’s library on Sunday wanted to have an “out-of-body experience”, suggests the email that he sent to his professor.
The document accessed by The Hindu reads: “Ever to the surface, in the past few months, has the need in me to venture beyond the body, to investigate into the physical death, been provoked [sic]”.
In the two-paragraph note, the student said he would not be able to prevent the email from reaching the professor as he would have taken the extreme step by then. “Whether I am dead in whatever sense, mentally or physically incapacitated, paralysed, captured or not [sic],” he wrote.
On the note, clinical psychologist Rajat Mitra said, “The words by him are indicative that he may be looking for an out-of-body experience but not conclusive. It can only become more concrete after it is checked whether he had similar conversations with someone, or read books, or surfed websites on the subject.”
Parents examine body
Sources in police said his parents, both doctors, examined the body before the post-mortem. They had no clue about his mental state His friends, however, said he had become reclusive in the last few weeks.
In the email, he had also asked the professor to help his family bear with the loss. He also mentioned two friends. “I pray for the peace of all living and abiding things [sic],” he wrote.
Dr. Mitra said, “It appears that he had been thinking like this from a long time. I don’t see any feelings of rancor or helplessness or despair here. It looks like he has made a decision to go,” he said.
After the post-mortem at Safdarjung Hospital on Saturday, the body was handed over to the family. His school friends from Tamil Nadu recalled him as a brilliant student.
Suicide prevention helpline: Sanjivni, Society for Mental Health,Telephone: 011-4076 9002, Monday-Saturday, 10 a.m. -7.30 p.m.
