New Delhi: Bringing a new twist in the suicide case of the Dalit scholar Rohith Vemula that has created uproar in the nation, a latest media report has said that the Hyderabad University student was not a Dalit but an OBC.

Following initial investigations, as reported in TOI, a top police official said that it was revealed that Rohith Vemula’s parents belong to the stonecutting caste of Vadera, which is an Other Backward Class (OBC).

The police said that Rohith Vemula’s caste angle is being probed after a request from certain persons. The police refused to reveal the names of these people.

The recent reports, if found true, are likely to have serious implications on the whole episode as the cases against Union Minister Bandaru Dattatreya , BJP MLC Ramachandra Rao and University’s Vice-Chancellor Appa Rao, who have been booked under the SC/ST Act.

Rohith Vemula, a Ph.D scholar here committed suicide following alleged harassment by local BJP leaders and University V-C Appa Rao. Since then the University of Hyderabad has been at the receiving end of a lot of anger and criticism.