By A Mirsab and Afroz Alam for TwoCircles.net,
She was named Delta after the river deltas. A river delta is formed when a fast moving river meets a body of standing water like ocean and loses its speed and deposits at the meeting point all the sand that it was carrying. River deltas have lots of economic benefit. Perhaps, parents of Delta Meghwal also thought that she will be beneficial to the whole community or just like in Mathematics delta will represent the difference or change. All hopes and aspirations of the 17 year old came to an end on March 29, 2016 when she was found dead in a water tank.
Delta was born on May 7, 1999 in Trimohi village of Barmer District of Rajasthan near the Indo-Pak border.
She studied till fifth class at Rajiv Gandhi school and passed her standard eighth from a school two KM away from the town. She cleared her tenth from State Girls’ Medium School. In 2014 she passed her HSC from Late Freedom Fighter Tejuram State High College. She was the first girl from her village to go for higher education.
In 2014, she scored 469 marks out of 600 in an entrance test for Basic School Teachers Course (BSTC) and thereby obtained admission at Jain Adarsh Teacher Training Institute for Girls in Nokha, Bikaner and stayed in the campus hostel. She was hoping to become a teacher just like her father Mahendra Ram, a primary school teacher who encouraged Delta to study further.
As a seven-year-old, she had one of her artworks published in a magazine published by the Rajasthan Secretariat. This painting was liked by Vasundhara Raje, Chief Minister of Rajasthan and she had sent a letter of appreciation to her for this painting.
She was a talented girl who had secured first place in a state-level art competition while studying in the 9th Standard.
In addition to this she was a great orator who was fond of addressing people. At the tender age of 5 she had first time gave a speech and her English speech that she gave at the age of 8 is still remembered by people.
At the time of her death she was in second year of BSTC and she was the squad leader. She was a brave girl who would not tolerate any kind of discrimination and this was the reason that she was disliked by some teachers who would distinguish girls based on their caste. Meghwals have traditionally been weavers.
Theories and Facts of Delta’s death
College administration says Delta had gone home for Holi and she returned on March 28 at around 11am. That day there were three more girls with her in the hostel. She was not at her bed in the night at 12 am and she was found in the room of Physical Training Instructor Vijendra Singh. Warden asked both to write and sign a letter of ‘apology’ for this act and left them.
This was done in the presence of another professor Pragya Pratik Shukla. In the morning at around 5.45am teacher Leela informed warden that Delta is again missing from her room after which her body was found in a water tank.
Now this is the sequence of events told by the administration. Now listen what its principal has to add on top of it.
Principal of the college Dr Rajendra Shrimali told TwoCircles.net that Vejendra Singh is not of this college but of Shri Jain Adarsh Niketan Senior Secondary school (run by the same parent institution of Jain Adarsh Teacher Training Institute for Girls) and adds, “Earlier Singh, warden Priya Shukla and Prof Pragya Pratik Shukla were working at a school in Churu district. They knew each other very well”.
On the series of events happened on the previous night, he says that warden neither informed Delta’s parents nor to police. “Even I was not informed and I got to know only at 12 noon”, he says with confidence.
However, Delta’s family refuses to buy college’s theory and say that she was raped and subsequently she was thrown in water so that it may be assumed that she committed suicide. . Mahendra Ram Meghwal, Delta’s father registered an FIR after discovery of her body and alleged in the FIR that one day earlier, on March 28, she had called her parents and told them that she had been raped by her PT instructor.
They also question as to why they were not informed in the morning about night’s incidence? And why PTI was not handed over to police? Why the letter of apology was got written in the night itself? Why both apology letters were written by Pragya ratik Shukla? What was he doing in the girls hostel at night?
They also question when her body was retrieved from water it had many injuries that cannot be inflicted by a person committing suicide. Moreover the photo of Delta taken by people after retrieving her from water clearly shows blood in her mouth.
According to Dr. Bheemrao of Nokha post-mortem shows that there was no water in her lungs clearly indicating that she was first killed and then was thrown in water.
He also says there were injuries near her chest, hands and elbow that cannot be there if she could have committed suicide.
He also says as per guard who found her body in a tank, her body was floating in it after he “opened” the tank’s tap. How can tap be placed over the tank if she committed suicide?
Sources say there are 35 CCTV cameras in the college premises but most of them were not working. There was no camera installed near the hostel. Police is verifying all the available footages. It is also checking Delta’s mobile to find any clues.
In the meanwhile the doctors of medical board who performed post-mortem said in their re-opinion that death could have been done due to her sinking in water. Police also claim that their investigation reveals that she died due to sinking in water.
Locals are in an ambiguity as to why doctors issue re-opinion and why police are in a hurry to declare death as suicide. People say if need be then doctors should perform re-post mortem than issuing re-opinion.
People also believe that police should wait till forensic report comes than straightaway declare it to be suicide.
TCN went to police station in Nokha and tried to get comments from Thanedar Puja Yadav and DSP Bhawani singh but they did not reply and simply said matter was being investigated by Satnam Singh.
FIR is registered at Nokha 146/16. People in the area say that police were given 7 days time to arrest culprits but it has so far arrested only 3 men but Ishwar Chand Vaidya who is owner of the college is not arrested. People are on strike here demanding his arrest and to revoke permission of the college. They also demand CBI probe as they believe police are in hand with Vaidya.
Local people are questioning as to why college did not pay any tribute to her or observed silence for couple of minute or give holiday? Why college is running as if nothing has happened there? The people here have more questions than answers over Delta’s sudden death. And all these questions are sensible and needs to be answered to uncover mystery behind her death.
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Delta Meghwal Death Mystery