The Supreme Court on Monday rejected the anticipatory bail plea of Dr M Kodanda Ram, the prime accused in the abetment of suicide case related to the death of 22-year-old dental student Nithin Raj. He had approached the apex court after the High Court denied his plea on June 19.

A Bench of Justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta described the professor's conduct as "inhuman" and observed that he could not walk away without facing the consequences of his actions.

"Inhuman is the only word that comes to mind. How does he address the students?" the Bench remarked.

Nithin Raj, a dental student in Kannur, died by suicide on April 10 after jumping from a building near the college. Before his death, he had allegedly faced caste-based harassment from members of the faculty. Police booked Dr Ram, the head of the department at the college and two other staff members for abetment of suicide and offences under the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989, based on a complaint filed by the student's father.

Dr Ram and another accused faculty member, Dr Sangeetha Nambiar, had earlier moved a sessions court seeking anticipatory bail. While the court granted anticipatory bail to Dr Nambiar on April 25, it rejected Dr Ram's plea. He then approached the High Court, which also declined to grant him anticipatory bail. He subsequently challenged the order before the Supreme Court.

Appearing for Dr Ram, Senior Advocate Dama Seshadri Naidu argued that there was a gap of one month between the alleged incident involving the professor and the student's suicide.

"Let us assume he humiliated him on a particular day. One month later, an hour before suicide, another professor complained to the principal that he had taken a loan from an app with the professor as guarantor. He was called and reprimanded in the principal's chamber. The incident with the professor was one month ago. The loan app incident was one hour ago. He hasn't said anything about caste. So the SC/ST Act goes away. It will have a chilling effect on professors who would like to impose some discipline," Naidu submitted.

The Bench, however, was not persuaded. "He has to realise the consequences of his actions. If a student is insulted in this way in the classroom, what will be the impact?" the court asked.

"It happened one month ago," Naidu maintained. "It was the tipping point," the Bench replied.

Naidu further argued that the student's reprimand over the loan app issue shortly before his death could have been the immediate trigger. "That teacher can't walk away with such kind of behaviour. A message has to go," the court observed. "The professor has learned his lesson," Naidu responded.

"No question about learning lesson. We won't ask you to read the lines aloud," the Bench said, referring to the words allegedly used by the professor against the student. When Naidu submitted that the English translation of the remarks might not fully capture their meaning, the court refused to interfere with the High Court's order and dismissed the appeal.
(With Bar and Bench inputs)