TELANGANA-SUICIDES 2 LASTTELANGANA-SUICIDES 2 LAST

After a lull between October last and March, the suicide After a lull between October last and March, the suicide saga began once again with the self-immolation of an MBA student in Warangal ten days ago. The Telangana protagonists lost no time in projecting it as "yet another sacrifice" for the statehood cause while police investigation established that the student Bhojya Naik ended his life because of "love failure". "He, no doubt, shouted Jai Telangana before setting himself on fire but the real reason for his extreme step was love failure," a senior police officer said. Police tracked Naik’s cell phone records to establish the reason for his suicide. Even the suicide by an auto-rickshaw driver Rajamouli two days later in Hanumakonda too was not for Telangana as claimed by the protagonists. Rajamouli felt "harassed" by the traffic police and wrote a petition to the district Superintendent of Police listing his travails before ending his life. "Every case of suicide has a reason....not all cases can be linked to Telangana. But given the sensitivities involved, the claims are not being countered,” the minister observed. When the then Chief Minister Y S Rajasekhara Reddy died in a helicopter crash in September 2009, press notes were issued from the Congress Legislature Party daily listing the number of persons who died either of "shock" or committed suicide unable to bear the "tall leader's" tragic end. The count stopped somewhere near 400 after people, including senior Congress leaders, started mocking at the deaths. But families of those 400-odd people are getting some "relief" as YSR's son and Kadapa MP Jaganmohan Reddy is going round the state distributing financial aid (ranging up to Rs one lakh each) as part of his Odarpu Yatra. In contrast, families of the youths who supposedly "sacrificed" their lives for a state are virtually left in the lurch. "We have given some relief to a few families so far and many more are yet to be given," TRS leader in the Assembly E Rajender said. Congress MPs and MLAs from the region embarked on a relief distribution mission a few months ago and gave up abruptly after extending financial assistance to a handful of families.