Daily NEWS Srilanka

While those who reached top positions at the O/L Examination were highly acclaimed by the media, news is reported of those who attempted suicide for having been unsuccessful at this examination as well as 2 students who were successful in taking their life.

Higher ups of certain Colombo schools have even gone to the extent of conveying through telephone calls about how students of their school have secured 9 A's ... 8 A's etcetera simply because of the competition that prevails among

The final outcome of this mental pressure is recorded across incidents where a schoolboy by the name of Chamod Lalantha Udayawarna living in Anuradhapura was found lying dead having committed suicide by the side of the railway track close to Ja Ela Railway Junction and schoolgirl Chalani Lakshani of Kahatuduwa, Kiriwaththuduwa committing suicide by hanging herself on an ambarella branch of a tree behind her house day-before-yesterday (28) night. Apart from that, 3 other schoolgirls of 2 leading schools in Gampola area had taken an overdose with the idea of ending their lives. They are presently under treatment at Gampola Hospital after being admitted there.

Chamod Lalantha Udayawarna had jumped in front of a moving train and thus killed himself because he had failed in the subject of Maths for the second time. He had informed one of his friends by telephone that he was afraid of facing the future , it was reported. The schoolgirl referred to above of course was not someone who failed in Maths but mentally disturbed because she had secured only a simple pass for that subject. She had been following studies in her 12th Year at a school in Homagama and had sat for the Maths paper at the O/L last year and had obtained a simple pass in that case. After which she had pursued her studies in the Arts stream at the A/L for sometime. Subsequently on a promise given by her to school authorities that she would secure a pass had then switched over to follow the subject of Commerce in preference to Arts, thus getting the opportunity to follow Commerce. She had however been mentally worried as she would not be able to follow studies in the subject of Commerce in the future at the A/L.

The 3 students of Gampola too were highly distressed for being not successful at the exam and consequently had lost interest in living anymore and had resorted to taking those drugs, they had mentioned later. The three of them had not known each other and had committed those acts separately, it was reported. Hospital sources say that they had fallen sick because one student has taken about 40 Panadol tablets while another student had taken an excess quantity of capsules used in the form of inhalers.