Ruling out religious conversion angle in the suicide of a 17-year-old class 12 student at a Christian aided school in Thanjavur district on January 2022, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) informed Madras High Court Bench in Madurai that she was not coerced to change her faith to Christianity.

This is a big blow to the BJP and the Sangh Parivar which have been in the forefront of a campaign that the girl, a hostler of the 163-year-old Sacred Heart Girls Higher Secondary School at Thirukattupalli, 207 km south of Chennai, had taken the extreme step due to pressure to convert. The Party had demanded a CBI probe into the issue and the girl’s parents too joined the chorus, even as there was a charge that her step mother had ill-treated her.

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The BJP and its sister organisations have tried to use this to paint the DMK government as anti-Hindu. An NCPR team also visited and held enquiries at the school. BJP president J P Nadda had even constituted a four-member panel to go into the issue.

When the Madurai Bench pulled up the state police and handed over the investigation to the central agency, it appeared to lend credence to the saffron party’s claim of forced conversion. When the State government challenged it before the Supreme Court, the apex court had upheld the High Court order.

The girl had died on January 19, 2022 at the Thanjavur Government Hospital a few days after consuming poison at her home during the Pongal vacation. The hostel warden, Sr Sagaya May was arrested on the charge of abetment to suicide. She later came out on bail. When she was still in hospital, a Vishwa Hindu Parishad functionary of Thanjavur released a video of the girl in which she speaks about being asked to do administrative work and informing that another sister at the hostel had asked her, in the presence of parents, if she was willing to convert. This was after a magistrate had recorded her statement wherein she did not say anything about conversion.

The CBI submission that there was no conversion angle to the teen’s suicide was made when the petition of Sagaya Mary, seeking to quash the chargesheet in the case came up for hearing before Justice G Ilangovan. However, opposing the plea the counsel for the central agency submitted that the girl was asked to carry out some administrative work because of which she could not concentrate on studies. She took the extreme step not due to pressure to convert her faith. He further submitted that the agency had collected 265 documents and conducted inquiries with 141 persons besides seizing seven items for evidence.

Contending that the case was baseless and misconceived, the petitioner submitted that no prima facie case has been established against her. The allegations in the FIR were vague, unsubstantiated and based on vague statements of the girl on some stray incidents of scolding and being asked to do some administrative work for the hostel. In all the four alleged statements of the deceased, submitted along with the final report, there is nothing to indicate specific acts of violence or torture, pushing her to take the extreme step. Hearing the arguments, the Judge posted further hearing in the case to September 26.