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Updated: Dec 25, 2018 23:24 IST

A 17-year-old student preparing for the entrance exam for admission to premier Indian Institutes of Technology was found hanging at his hostel room in Rajasthan’s private coaching hub of Kota on Tuesday. This is the third such case in Kota since Saturday and has again highlighted issues like stress and parental pressure that have been blamed for a spate of student suicides in Kota since 2013.

Rajasthan Police’s assistant sub-inspector Ramswaroop said 17-year-old’s cousin, who is also enrolled at a Kota private coaching centre, found him hanging from the ceiling fan of his room. Singh’s parents in Bihar’s Sivan had asked the cousin to check on the teenager after he did not respond to their phone calls.

Police said the boy’s body had been sent for a post-mortem, which will be conducted upon the arrival of his parents. Police added that no suicide note was found.

Also Read: Inside Kota’s coaching factories: Pressure, anxiety prey on students

As many as 19 students have committed suicide in Kota this year. Another 17-year-old student, who was preparing for the entrance exam, too, was found hanging from the ceiling fan of her hostel room on Monday. She was from Kushinagar in Uttar Pradesh.

According to Kota district administration data, 58 students enrolled at private coaching centres in Kota committed suicide between 2013 and 2017. In 2017, there was a dip in the suicides, which were down to seven compared to 17 in 2016 and 16 in 2015. The current year is turning out to be the worst in terms of student suicides in the last half-a-decade.

A Tata Institute of Social Sciences report blamed study stress, parental pressure, depression, homesickness, love affairs, liquor or drug abuse and emotional issues for the suicides