Adding to the woes of the Hindu community in the Sindh region of Pakistan, Nimrita Chandani, a Hindu medical student studying at the Bibi Asifa Dental College in Larkana was found dead in the hostel room on Monday.
The victim hailed from Mirpur Mathelo, a taluka in Ghotki, which has been ravaged with communal violence over the past few days. A principal of a Hindu school in Ghotki was beaten up by a mob and an FIR was filed against him for allegedly speaking in a derogatory fashion of the Prophet of Islam.
Chandani was found in her room lying on a mat with a rope around her neck. However, the door of her room was locked from the inside and the police are yet to ascertain if the death was a murder or suicide.
However, Chandani's family allege that she was murdered and have asked for a probe into the incident. Chandani's brother, Dr Wishal, spoke to the media. He said that there were marks on her neck akin to that of a cable wire even though she was wearing a dupatta.
Chandani's death was discovered on Monday when her colleagues were suspicious when she did not respond to them repeatedly knocking on her door.
"She was neither responding to the knocking at the door nor to our shouting," one of the girls had told the police, India Today reports. The friends had even looked through the gap in the door.
The hostel watchman was called and he then broke down the door to find her lying on the mat.
The vice-chancellor of the Chandani's college said that her death was due to suicide while the police said that they will find the cause of death only after her post-mortem. Her body has been shifted to the district headquarter for a postmortem which will take place once her parents arrive from Karachi to give their consent.
Violence against members of the Hindu community, which is a minority in Pakistan, has been growing at an alarming intensity. A few months earlier, news surfaced that numerous Hindu girls in the Sindh region were kidnapped and forcibly converted to Islam.
The abductions sparked a nation-wide outrage in India and triggered many protests. A video also surfaced of a cleric performing the nikaah (marriage) ceremony of the two girls.
Ramesh Kumar Vankwani, a Hindu leader part of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf, had then brought up two bills and one resolution in the National Assembly. They addressed child marriage, forced conversions and the protection of minorities in the country.
