Prof ends life over 'corruption' in choosing VCs

A professor in a city-based college has allegedly committed suicide, because he thought the process to select vice-chancellors of universities is mired in corruption.

The suicide comes at a time when the search is on to appoint a new vice-chancellor to the University of Mysore (UoM), with the term of the incumbent, Prof V G Talwar, set to end soon.

Prof U B Ashok Kumar, 52, Head of the Department of Sociology of the Maharaja’s Evening College (which comes under UoM) and a resident of New Kantharaj Urs Road, has left behind a death note expressing dissatisfaction about the system.

System condemned

He was a native of Channagiri taluk in Davangere district. According to police, Kumar had been to Hassan for a function, along with his wife Cheluvambika and two daughters.

However, Kumar returned home alone the same night. On Thursday morning, his wife and children returned, only to find him hanging from the ceiling.

Police said, the professor, in a death note addressed to the President of India, has resented the system in which crores of rupees are spent by aspirants to become vice-chancellors and the need to rectify the same.

A day’s holiday was declared for the college as a mark of respect for Kumar. Saraswatipuram police have registered a case.