Hyderabad: The Telangana Police has closed its probe into the death of Rohith Vemula, claiming he was not a Dalit and died by suicide because he was afraid his “real caste identity” would be discovered.
Reacting to the claim, Rohith’s brother Raja Vemula termed it “absurd”.
“I don’t know how to express my feelings,” Raja told ThePrint.
Rohith Vemula’s death by suicide in January 2016 triggered nationwide protests over the discrimination against Dalits in universities.
In a closure report submitted to the Telangana High Court Friday, the state police claimed that Rohith was not a Dalit and that he died because he was afraid his “real caste identity” would be discovered. The closure report also gave a clean chit to the accused, absolving then Secunderabad MP Bandaru Dattatreya, MLC N. Ramchander Rao and University of Hyderabad Vice Chancellor Appa Rao, besides Union Minister for Women and Child Development Smriti Irani and leaders of the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP).
Irani was Minister for Human Resource Development at the time of Rohith’s death.
Claiming that the caste certificates of the Vemula family were forged, the closure report said the case has been closed on account of lack of evidence. The high court has now directed the Vemula family to appeal to the lower court in the form of a protest petition.
Rohith’s brother Raja Vemula said the family will be travelling to Hyderabad to meet Chief Minister Revanth Reddy on 4 May.
He pointed out that the police stopped investigating the case after 2017, and that a series of observational statements from 15 witnesses on the caste verification case for the Vemula family — given to the district collector — did not find mention in the report. “All these statements have not even been mentioned, for reasons best known to them only,” he said.
According to the law, it is the district collector who can pass an order on caste status — not the police. A district-level scrutiny committee (DLSC) collects evidence and passes it on to the district collector.
“The collector has not finished adjudicating the matter,” said senior advocate A. Satya Prasad, who appeared on behalf of the Vemula family in the high court Friday.
“Without the collector’s decision, the DLSC cannot be taken as a basis to cancel Vemula’s caste status. It’s totally incorrect,” he added.
The judge also commented on why the report was filed in such a hurried manner, according to Satya Prasad.
“The police report deviates from what actually happened. Instead of investigating whether Rohith committed suicide because of provocation by the University Vice Chancellor and the BJP, they investigated the caste state of the deceased,” he told ThePrint.
ThePrint reached investigating officer C.H. Sreekanth, ACP of the Madhapur division, Cyberabad, who declined to comment. According to the closure report, Sreekanth, who was transferred and posted as ACP on 2 March 2024, took the case diary soon thereafter on 18 March 2024 and signed the report on 21 March 2024.
“I have nothing to comment,” said Appa Rao Podile, former V-C of the University of Hyderabad. “When the judiciary or police have announced after certain proceedings, I don’t have anything else to offer on that,” he told ThePrint.
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‘Totally hypothetical’
The closure report explicitly stated that Rohith Vemula and his family, including his mother Radhika Vemula and brother Raja, are not Dalits.
“The deceased himself is aware that he does not belong to Scheduled Caste and his mother got him SC certificate. This could be one of the constant fears as the exposure the same would put him to loss (sic) of his academic degrees that he earned over the years and be compelled to face prosecution. This, the deceased had multiple issues worrying him which could have driven him to commit suicide. Despite best efforts, no evidence could be found to establish that the actions of the accused have driven the deceased to commit suicide,” it read.
Radhika Vemula has always maintained that she belongs to the Mala caste, a Scheduled Caste, but was raised as a domestic worker by a Vaddera OBC family from childhood. She was abandoned by her husband who belongs to the Vaddera community, Mani Kumar, after he found out about her caste identity.
Jai Bhima Rao, lawyer for the Vemula family, told ThePrint that the investigating authorities should be booked under section 4 of the SC and ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act for “preparing such a mischievous report”.
“How did they draw the conclusion that Rohith Vemula does not belong to Scheduled Caste and that this was the reason for his suicide? No valid evidence is mentioned, it’s totally hypothetical and has no bearing. It’s atrocious,” said Rao. He added, “It is a stigmatic remark and for that, the investigating authority is liable to punishment.”
Rao also said that the prosecution relied on the DLSC — the report submitted to the district collector to investigate — which cannot be the final report on the matter or conclusive proof. No report was given by the collector thereafter, and the investigation was stalled at that stage in 2021.
“So without considering the law, the authorities have drawn conclusions based on a preliminary report that’s not final. Action has to be taken against the investigating authorities,” he said.
Struggle continues
Satya Prasad also commented on the timing of the report.
“The allegations are against BJP leaders. Now, the police have given a clean chit to those same leaders — when a Congress government is in power. It’s very unfortunate,” he said.
The Congress has repeatedly supported the ‘Justice for Vemula’ campaign. Party leader Rahul Gandhi had in November 2022 invited Radhika Vemula to join the party, and the party in a resolution passed at its 85th plenary session last February promised to enact a law called the “Rohith Vemula Act” to “safeguard the right to education and dignity” for SC, ST, OBC and other minority groups. The Congress is yet to comment on the closure report.
“[The report] is hurtful, to say the least, to see this development, but it is not coming as a shock either,” said Arpita Jaya, a former student at the University of Hyderabad who was at the helm of the protests that rocked the campus after Vemula’s suicide. “Strength and solidarity to Radhika amma and the Ambedkar Students Association,” she added.
“This seems to be an explicit nexus between the Telangana state police and the ABVP and RSS,” added Iniyavan Banumathi, former president of the Ambedkar Students Association (ASA) as he waited at the Telangana High Court for updates on the case hearing.
“The report resonates with what the RSS narrative has been since 2015. This same theory has just been repeated in the police report. However, the ASA will stand firm along with other progressive organisations in fighting till justice is served for Rohith and other socially boycotted Dalit scholars,” Banumathi told ThePrint.
(Edited by Amrtansh Arora)
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