Indian student's self-immolation after sexual harassment complaint sparks national outrage
The woman, a second-year undergraduate studying education at Fakir Mohan Autonomous College in Balasore, Odisha, self-immolated on Saturday, moments after leaving the office of the college principal. She suffered over 90 per cent burns and was rushed to the All India Institute of Medical Science in Bhubaneswar, where she died late on Monday night.
Her father, speaking to local media, accused the college of conspiring against his daughter. 'My daughter was killed,' he said in Hindi, breaking down on television. 'She always raised her voice in college, so they targeted her. Everyone forced her to die. Is this not murder?'
He claimed that his daughter had complained of sexual harassment by Sameer Ranjan Sahoo, the head of the education department, accusing him of demanding sexual favours and threatening to ruin her career. 'She didn't open up completely but said the accused was pressuring her,' he said, reported India Today.
Mr Sahoo has been suspended and arrested, with a local court placing him under 14 days' judicial custody.
The student had formally approached the college's Internal Complaints Committee (ICC), naming Mr Sahoo and claiming that the principal, Dillip Ghosh, and other college authorities failed to act on her initial complaints. The ICC is said to have promised action, but the family say none was taken. She had also approached the police and even met her local MP, but the family say the alleged harassment continued.
Mr Ghosh was suspended as principal by the college on Sunday, and arrested on Monday when the student was still in critical condition in hospital.
Local opposition leader Bhakta Charan Das, the Odisha Congress Party chief, announced a state-wide shut-down on 17 July to protest the 'collapse of the justice redressal system'.
Thousands attended the student's cremation in her home village on Tuesday, including the local state legislator from the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, Pratap Sarangi, and other officials. Mohan Charan Majhi, Odisha's chief minister, expressed his condolences and vowed 'strict action' while offering £18,500 in compensation for the family.
The case has triggered a political storm in Odisha and beyond. Former chief minister and Biju Janata Dal (BJD) party leader Naveen Patnaik blamed the BJP-led state government, calling the girl's death 'institutional betrayal' and a result of 'planned injustice'.
'She went from pillar to post for justice but was failed by the very system meant to protect her,' Mr Patnaik wrote on X (formerly Twitter). 'She did not die due to injuries alone, but because the state left her alone in her struggle.'
National opposition leader Rahul Gandhi called the student's death 'an organised murder by the system' and said those meant to protect her 'kept breaking her'. In a sharply worded post on X calling out prime minister Narendra Modi, he added: 'Whether in Odisha or Manipur, the daughters of the nation are burning, breaking, and dying. And you [prime minister Narendra Modi] remain silent.'
Union education minister Dharmendra Pradhan said Mr Gandhi was politicising the incident, stating that the welfare of women was a top priority for the BJP-led central government.
In response to the public outcry, the University Grants Commission (UGC), a statutory body under the education ministry, has set up a fact-finding team led by Raj Kumar Mittal. The panel will examine the circumstances of the student's death, review the college's compliance with regulatory norms, and assess the effectiveness of anti-harassment mechanisms.
Other members of the committee include UGC joint secretary Ashima Mangla, Gujarat University vice-chancellor Neerja Gupta, and former UGC member Sushma Yadav. The panel has been asked to submit its report by 22 July.
The UGC said the committee would visit the college, engage with students, staff and administrators, and assess the safety measures and institutional culture related to student welfare.
Meanwhile, the victim's family continues to demand answers. 'Why was she called alone to the principal's office? What happened inside? Why were we not informed?' her father asked while speaking to ANI. 'I request the government to acknowledge that my daughter didn't die, she was killed, and everyone should be charged with murder," he said.
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In the video footage of the encounter, which Fairfax county police released a few months after Bijan's death, you can see Bijan's Jeep driving away and then stopping a second time and Amaya running to the vehicle with his gun drawn, banging it against the window. Bijan drives off again and there is a short chase before he pulls over again and the park police stop in front of his Jeep. As Bijan's car rolls slowly forward, Amaya jumps out of his car with his gun unholstered and fires repeatedly through the windshield. Bijan's car begins to roll into a ditch as Amaya is joined by Vinyard and then they shoot into the car again. After the car stops, Amaya reholsters his gun, before pulling his weapon out again and firing through the windshield. 'They just kept firing,' says Kelly quietly. 'They shot my son, who was unarmed, 10 times in the head at close range. The whole incident from start to finish took less than 10 minutes.' Across town, Kelly and her husband, James, were at home with no idea that their lives as they had known them had come to an end. 'Everything was great, the kids were great, it was all perfect,' she says. 'I was an interior designer, James was an accountant, we had a beautiful home.' That night, 'the whole thing fell apart.' At 1am two park police officers knocked on the front door. From the very first interaction, Kelly knew things were wrong. They told the couple that there had been a shootout and Bijan was in the hospital. 'Like some gangster thing happened,' says Kelly. 'And I said: 'A shootout? That's not possible.' Because Bijan was so anti-gun, he would never have had a gun in his car. So from those very first moments they were lying to us.' The officers gave the Ghaisars their card and told them to call them when they got to the hospital. 'And we never saw them again,' says Kelly. 'They never, ever picked up the phone when we tried to call.' 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In 2020 a Fairfax grand jury indicted Vinyard and Amaya for manslaughter, which Kelly says 'felt like a turning point'. Then, in October 2021, a federal judge dismissed all criminal charges against the officers on the basis of qualified immunity laws, which protect government workers from prosecution for actions taken within their official capacity if it can't be proved that they violated constitutional or statutory rights or acted with 'malicious intent'. 'The judge said that these two men were fine police officers and what they did was 'necessary and proper',' says Kelly. 'This is how our system works, that a judge can write these words about the killing of an unarmed 25-year-old man. That it was necessary and proper.' Amaya and Vinyard were put on paid leave after Bijan's death. In January this year, in a huge blow to the Ghaisar family, they went back to work at the park police. 'Which didn't surprise me but did disgust us all,' says Kelly. She says she will never accept that this is the end. 'I will not stop fighting for Bijan, not while I still live and breathe.' In 2018 the family started the Bijan Ghaisar Foundation to support organisations fighting gun violence and police brutality, and to lobby for stricter gun protection laws. In particular, Kelly has become an impassioned campaigner against qualified immunity. 'This is my number one goal, my life mission,' she says. 'I'm not naive any more – I know this probably won't happen in my lifetime – but that doesn't mean I'm going to stop for a second.' Although Bijan's photos are still all over their house and Kelly visits his grave every day, the old family traditions – the movie nights, the identical festive pyjama sets – have gone. 'When my daughter and son-in-law are around for the holidays, we all sit down, get out our laptops and strategise the next steps for our foundation,' she says. 'This is what we do together now.' She is no longer the same person, she says. 'The person I was before Bijan was killed has completely gone. She is gone. When you bring a life into the world and nurture that life and watch it grow into something as special as our son was, to see it just taken away so thoughtlessly, so pointlessly – it could have broken me for good. But I've found a fire and a strength within me that I never thought was there, and that is down to Bijan and my love for him.' She has survived thanks to her friends, her family and her activism. 'But number one is Bijan. He is the force holding me up, giving me strength and light and love to do what I'm trying to do.' People ask her how she hasn't been corroded away by bitterness, grief or rage. 'And I say: Bijan would not want that. Any negative energy was wrong to him, so I'm just channelling his spirit every day, and every day I get stronger. Because this is what Bijan would want me to do. Never give up.' Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.
The Guardian
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Ex-officer sentenced to nearly three years for role in Breonna Taylor's killing
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