KOLKATA/KHARAGPUR: The IIT-Kharagpur campus was jolted by the news of yet another death after a 21-year-old, third-year biotechnology student was found hanging from the roof of the Sarojini Naidu and Indira Gandhi Hall on Monday morning.
Other students saw Devika Pillai’s body hanging from the roof of the two-storey building around 7am and alerted the campus’s security and medical teams.Pillai, who came from Kerala, was undergoing treatment for depression and mental health issues, they added.
Pillai’s death is the third of a student on the IIT Kharagpur campus since 2022. Mechanical engineering student Faizan Ahmed died in October that year. The campus management initially said the Assam boy died by suicide but his parents alleged murder, prompting Calcutta High Court to order a probe by a special investigation team. Electrical engineering student K Kiran Chandra died by suicide on the campus in October 2023.
Many on the campus on Monday raised questions over the circumstances in which Pillai’s body was found. How could Pillai, who lived in A Block, get access to the B-Block roof, they asked, especially as students were barred from hostel roofs.
IIT Kharagpur, in an official release, said the institute was devastated by the tragedy. “Cops and her family have been informed. Cops are conducting a thorough investigation into the circumstances of Pillai’s death and the institute is cooperating in the probe,” it added.
Officials said a postmortem probe was conducted on Monday evening.
Preliminary investigations indicated it may be a suicide but it was too early to say anything definitive, a senior police officer said.
“We have seized a diary, a laptop, a mobile phone, the rope (used for the hanging), some medicines and other articles,” he added.