Former model Viveka Babajee committed suicide by hanging herself inside her flat in Khar on Friday night. Babajee’s boyfriend Gautam Vora could be booked immediately for abetting the suicide if her family alleges foul play against him, an officer from the Khar police station said.

Viveka was born and brought up in Mauritius. She was crowned Miss Mauritius in 1993. Her ad campaigns include Coca Cola, Live In Jeans and Kamasutra condoms. Her favourite actresses are Madhuri Dixit and Demi Moore. Viveka's debut film, Yeh Kaisi Mohabbat (costarring Sharad Kapoor and Deepak Tijori), bombed at the box office

If the family decides against filing any complaint, the police will have to gather circumstantial evidence and record statements of common friends. Vora, a stockbroker and a resident of Napean Sea Road, has come under the scanner after his name surfaced in Babajee’s diary.

“We are waiting for the family to recover,” Amitabh Gupta, additional commissioner of police, west region, said. “Our next action will depend on their statements.” If the family does not allege foul play, the police will have to record statements of friends who may have witnessed fights. Also, they will have to go through Babajee’s phone records and emails to see if she had been mentally harassed.

A diary recovered from Babajee’s apartment had an entry, “You killed me Gautam Vora.” The police, however, say this is not strong enough to book Vora for abetting her suicide.

“The entry is not dated and abrupt in nature,” an investigating officer said. Though the police do not suspect foul play, they are waiting for the viscera report from the Kalina forensic laboratory to get a clear picture.

While seeking anticipatory bail, Vora told the court that he was with Babajee in her flat the night before she killed herself. They had met at a function in April and their friendship grew through social networking sites. An officer who was present in court said Vora told the court that Babajee kept talking about her failed relationships and her financial setbacks.

The post-mortem report said Babajee took anti-depressants, sleeping pills, drank alcohol, and smoked several cigarettes before hanging herself.

The last person supermodel Viveka Babaji is supposed to have called up on Friday before committing suicide, was Delhi-based model and Miss Asia-Pacific 2002, Tina Chatwal. Whether the gal-pals spoke before Viveka reportedly called her sister Neeta (not Vineeta, as was reported by the press yesterday) and said she was going to end her life, is not yet confirmed. But, sources say, Viveka poured her heart out to Tina and wept about the trauma she was undergoing in her relationship and business. If this is true, and Tina does admit that Viveka was anguished by her love life, then the police would certainly have some rather pointed questions to ask the deceased supermodel’s stock analyst boyfriend Gautam Vora.

The call to Tina was reportedly made after Viveka and Gautam had a spat in her highrise apartment in Bandra, and he walked out on her. Tina, who was in Mumbai yesterday for Viveka’s funeral and prayer meeting, is expected to make a statement to the police which could clear up much of the mystery surrounding the shocking suicide. Meanwhile, the buzz is that efforts are being made by some people to distract the focus from Gautam by spreading rumours of Viveka’s unhappy past with the other men in her life. The numbers and messages of the men who were in touch with her are being studied by the police. Some of the men she had dated, were back in contact with Viveka because they had renewed contact with her on her birthday, May 27. Much more is being made of her networking with these men than is necessary.

One male friend who messaged her on her birthday, and then a few days before her death asking her out to coffee, is worried he may get a visit from the police. He claims to have got an SOS call from Viveka’s anxious mother in Mauritius on Friday asking him to check out on her daughter, and reportedly assured her that the supermodel must be fine and just sleeping. Yesterday, when the mother and her other daughter Alka arrived for Viveka’s last rites, they were met at the airport by Bollywood filmmaker Rohit Jugraj with whom Viveka was involved two years ago. The family chose Mumbai as her final resting place despite Viveka’s Mauritian citizenship, because her heart belonged to Mumbai. “Sadly, it also got broken in the city she loved,” said a tearful friend.

While the speculation over the reason behind Viveka Babajee's suicide continues, all her friends and colleagues all in agreement about one thing  that she showed no signs of depression. They chose different words but said pretty much the same thing: She seemed positive, jovial and didn't show any signs of a person going through a crisis. One might argue that happy people don't kill themselves. Maybe she wasn't happy but chose to wear the 'all is well' mask. Or maybe all was well. It's possible that she was just having a particularly bad day, and that pushed her to end her life.

We all go through phases when life seems unbearably hard. Moments, when we question the meaning of it all, and wonder why one must continue to go on. A point in time, when we feel alone despite having the love and support of family and friends. Any normal, well-adjusted person can be driven to suicide in a weak moment on a exceptionally trying day. Most days we just trudge on. We cry, complain, crib and then put on a brave face.

Then one fine day, someone somewhere cannot summon the will to struggle, and just gives up.