KARACHI: A medical student committed suicide on Monday after a university refused to allow him to appear in the final year exam for being late, officials said.

Abdul Basit, 27, pursuing a Bachelor of Dental Surgery degree, was a fourth-year student at the Hamdard College of Medicine and Dentistry affiliated with Hamdard University.

Witnesses said that Basit, a resident of PECHS, reached the campus in North Nazimabad’s Sakhi Hasan area in his car about one-and-a-half hour late due to traffic jam. The administration did not allow him to take the exam.

They said that he visited the principal’s office and requested him to allow him to appear in the exam, but the principal reportedly asked him to appear in the supplementary examination.

Frustrated over the refusal, the student went outside the campus, drew fuel from his car and immolated himself.

Engulfed in flames, Basit was walking towards the campus when some students saw him and tried to put out the fire with some cloth.

Some students took him to the Abbasi Shaheed Hospital, which referred him to the Civil Hospital’s burns ward.

He was admitted to the CHK at 4.20pm, but died a few hours later during treatment, said additional police surgeon Dr Qarar Ahmed.

Senior medico-legal Officer Dr Nisar Shah told Dawn that the student had suffered over 86 per cent burns.

DIG-West Feroze Shah said that the administration did not allow him to appear in the exam because of his late arrival at the examination centre and their refusal prompted him to take his own life. He said he had formed a special team to investigate the incident.

Published in Dawn, April 12th, 2016