Saturday seemed like just another day for Ratnamma, a resident of Whitefield and mother of three daughters. But when the house-keeping staff at a private company returned home a little after 1pm, she found one of her daughters hanging from the ceiling.
16-year-old Rashmi had locked herself inside her room and hanged herself from the ceiling fan. The incident happened while Ratnamma was away at work and her other daughters had gone to school.
According to The Times of India, failure in Class 10 examination is what drove the teenager to take her own life.
In her complaint to the police, Ratnamma said that Rashmi was depressed over failing two subjects in school. Although she had appeared for supplementary examination, Rashmi had failed to pass in the two subjects, say reports.
“She had appeared for supplementary exams but failed in the two subjects in which she had failed earlier. Further, my husband had differences with us over family issues and Rashmi was deeply depressed about it," Ratnamma was quoted as saying.
Studies state that India has one of the world's highest suicide rates among youths aged between 15 and 29. According to NCRB data quoted by Hindustan Times in an article published in May this year, at least one student commits suicide every hour in the country.
While the number of student suicides in 2015 stood at 8,934, the number stood at 39,775 from the period between 2010 and 2015.
According to the data available for the year 2015, Maharashtra reported the highest number of student suicides with 1,230 of the total 8,934. This was followed by Tamil Nadu and Chattisgargh, with 955 and 625 respectively.
According to the data, 1360 students below the age of 18 years committed suicide due to failure in examinations. Of this, 697 are boys and 663 are girl students. The number is slightly on the decreasing side in the age group of 18 to 30 years, with 1183 students killing themselves over failure in exams. The number is the minimum in the age category of 30 years to 45 years, with 87 students killing themselves. Of this, a majority, that is 72 students were men.