When Ranjana Kumari's parents couldn't get her on the phone for two days, they informed others in the young PhD scholar's hostel at the Indian Institute of Technology in Madras, now Chennai. She was found dead in her room.

She had hung herself.

Ranjana Kumari, 25, was from Jharkhand. She joined IIT-M in 2017, and was working to earn a PhD in metallurgy and material sciences.

She is the second IIT-M student to commit suicide on campus in the last four months.

A young man from Kerala, Shahul Kornath, took his own life in September.