Bhubaneswar, July 17: An engineering student, whom neighbours described as “shy” and “simple”, committed suicide at Nayapalli today.

Sunita Mishra, 20, was found hanging from the ceiling fan of her rented house this afternoon.

Her friend, who stayed with her at the apartment, said Sunita had received a threat call from a man last night.

This is the second incident of a girl student committing suicide in the city in the past fortnight.

On July 4, a second-year postgraduate student of Utkal University had committed suicide in her hostel. The 22-year-old psychology second-year student, Jharana Swain of Utkal University, committed suicide by hanging herself in her hostel room. She too had not has not held anybody responsible for her death.

Sunita, who was from Sipura village near Mahanga in Cuttack district, was a fourth-year student of computer engineering in a city-based engineering college.

Police seized a suicide note, which did not hold anyone responsible for her death.“She had just completed her engineering course. She used to score good marks in her examinations. She was preparing for MTech,” said her father Keshab Chandra Mishra.

Police sources said she had been living in the area for the past year with a friend.

“Her friend, a hotel management professional, had left the house in the morning. We received the information about her death and immediately rushed to the spot. Later, the body was sent for post-mortem,” said an official of Nayapalli police station.

He said they were trying to find out if there was any love angle to the suicide.

Her neighbours described Sunita as a simple and shy girl.

Her friend, who lived with her in the rented house, said: “A man had called her last night and threatened her. This morning, when I left the room, there was nothing unusual about her behaviour. But when I phoned her around 9.30am, no one answered. Worried, I sent one of my friends to find out of everything was fine. My friend found the room locked from outside.”

Foul play whiff

Family members of Anand Bhusan Patel, a BTech student of a private engineering, who was found dead in a rented room at Khandagiri on June 9, today alleged that he had been murdered.

“There were blood stains on his bed and we had brought that to the notice of the police. But the police continue to describe the incident as suicide and are not conducting a thorough investigation,” Anand’s father Ashok Kumar Patel alleged.