Mumbai: Parents of the 22-year-old student of the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Bombay who died allegedly by suicide in his hostel room alleged on Saturday, September 19, that the youth was tortured.
Sahil Ravindra Wakode, a native of Maharashtra’s Yavatmal district, was found hanging from the ceiling fan in his room in Hostel Number 4 on the Powai campus on Friday evening, an official said.
A case was registered at Powai police station under Section 108 (abetment of suicide) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita along with relevant provisions of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act on the complaint of his parents, the official said.
The deceased student’s parents arrived in Mumbai from Yavatmal and claimed their son was subjected to institutional harassment and caste-based discrimination prior to his death, the official said.
No suicide note was found from the spot, the official said.
The police had initially registered an accidental death report in connection with the death.
Wakode used phone during exam, says institute
Wakode was a second-year BTech student in the Energy Science and Engineering department, he said.
According to a statement from IIT Bombay, the student had allegedly uploaded the examination question paper to ChatGPT to seek answers during the exam.
The official said Wakode’s death came to light after his hostel mates got no response from his room and alerted the authorities, who then informed the police.
The incident also triggered protests on campus, with students demanding an inquiry into the circumstances surrounding the death.
The institute, in a statement issued late on Friday, said that the student was found using a mobile phone in the exam hall earlier that day.
But no disciplinary action was initiated against him, it stated.
The instructor and the Head of the Department had discussed the matter with the student and counselled him, assuring him the incident would not adversely affect his academic career.
He subsequently returned to his hostel room and was found dead later in the evening.
“The Institute is extending support to the student’s friends, classmates, faculty members, and others affected by this tragic incident,” the statement said.
The circumstances surrounding the death are being probed, it added.
Third such death in seven months
The death is the third reported case of suicide at the IIT Bombay campus in Powai in seven months.
In February, a second-year student died by suicide in a hostel. In July 2026, at the beginning of the new semester, a 20-year-old second-year BTech student had also ended his life.
A group of students gathered on the campus and launched a protest, alleging that the administration had not disclosed all details surrounding the circumstances of the student’s death.
Some protesters claimed that Wakode had been threatened with a one-year suspension over the examination incident. They alleged that such a suspension could have required him to leave the hostel and stay outside the campus.
Students further claimed that disciplinary action of this nature could potentially have delayed completion of his engineering course beyond the standard four-year duration.
Protesting students alleged that the fear and pressure associated with possible disciplinary consequences may have played a role in the student’s death. However, these allegations have not been independently verified.
Another student claimed that several such incidents had occurred on campus this year and questioned whether sufficient steps were being taken to understand their causes.
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