UNIVERSITY DEPARTMENT HEAD STABBED BY STUDENT - Updates

Law student suffering from mental pressure had written suicide letter

     Police who were investigating about the student who attacked the Head of the Law Faculty of the Law Faculty  of the Open University a few days back have been able to uncover further information regarding him. The suspect 40 year old Sivagnanasunderam Suranjith is a married doctor. It is revealed that though married, because of personal problems his wife had deserted him with the child and both of them are living in Australia, separated from him. This doctor who was a resident of Kilinochchi and was serving in Jaffna had been living in Colombo as he was preparing for his Degree in Law. His present residence is in Kotahena. Because of personal problems and mental pressure, he had been unable to pursue his studies in Law properly. He had been in a disappointed mental state because he had been unsuccessful in his examinations from time to time and at a moment when he had been unsuccessful in the entrance tests, he had met the Head of the Law Faculty and complained to her, saying that they had failed him in the examinations on purpose.

   It was revealed in the investigations that many such instances had dawned on him in the past. As a result of his constant failure, his period of study had been delayed unnecessarily and in addition he had not been granted leave in his medical profession and has had to face great impediments. In the process, the specific time-limit granted to him to complete the project dissertation due for the academic year too had elapsed. Though she had approached the Head of the Faculty to hand over his papers, she had continuously rejected accepting it explaining that it is not possible to violate the regulations. 

   He had then threatened her and gone away last Tuesday saying, "Why are you'll doing this to me .....everytime you'll have failed me ...... now you say that you can't accept this .... you wait and see what I'll do to you!" She had however showed no reaction to his threat.

   It is in this manner that he had contemplated murdering the Head of the Law Faculty, Mrs.Kadiragamathambi and then tried to commit suicide the coming Wednesday.For this purpose he had armed himself with a machete and had written a letter explaining what he was going to do.

  What he had written there is that this Head of of the said Faculty should be held responsible for his failure in examinations as well as his defeat in life. He had also mentioned that for not accepting his thesis, it was going to be the final blow that he would be encountering and that the only satisfaction he could gain is by putting an end to her life.  The letter also goes on to say that he would be killing her and then finish his own life by taking sleeping pills. Finally he has added that after his death all his assets be transferred to his child's name.

   In this manner, he had put the letter he had written in his pocket with the machete in his travelling bag and walked into the Faculty as a normal undergraduate would. The Head of the Faculty,Mrs.Kadiragamathambi however had not realised that the suspect had come that day in a different sort of mood. But since he had been coming again and again, it made her lift her head up with some suspicion. The youth then rushed at her and began to attack her with the machete without uttering a word.

   His target had been her chest. But because she managed to evade the blow directly, the knife-blow cut a portion of her hair and struck her neck and the chest causing injuries and finally she collapsed. When she had fallen down and lying there in a pool of blood, the assailant fled to the top floor and hid in a room there. Inside the room he had taken sleeping pills and had remained there for quite some time. It was after this that lecturers in the Faculty and security forces managed to get at the youth. It was reported that at that moment he had shouted almost  in a frenzy asking that his property be given to his child.

     The Head of the Faculty was admitted to Kalubowila Hospital and from there transferred to the Colombo National Hospital. Her condition is now out of danger because no serious damage has been done to her nervous system or arteries. The suspect who took an overdose of sleeping tablets and was admitted to the Kalubowila Hospital too became normal after a few hours on admission.

     Though no casualties were reported in the incident, the mental condition and the attempt to commit suicide will be inquired into in courts.