KOLKATA– A second-year electrical engineering student at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Kharagpur was found dead under mysterious circumstances on campus Monday night, marking the second student death at the institute in just four days.
The student, identified as Chandradip Pawar, was a resident of Madhya Pradesh. According to institute officials, Pawar had dinner Monday night and took a prescribed medication afterward. Local police sources said the tablet may have gotten lodged in his windpipe, leading to suffocation and death. He was rushed to a hospital within the campus, where doctors pronounced him dead on arrival.
Authorities have sent the body for a post-mortem examination to determine the exact cause of death. An investigation has been launched, and Pawar’s family was informed Monday night. They arrived in Kharagpur on Tuesday morning.
An internal source at the institute said Pawar had recently shown signs of being under mental stress, raising further questions about the circumstances surrounding his death.
This is the fifth unnatural on-campus student death at IIT Kharagpur in recent months. Just four days earlier, on July 18, Ritam Mondal, a fourth-year mechanical engineering student, was also found dead in his hostel room under similarly unclear circumstances.
Other recent cases include the January 12 death of Shaon Malik, a third-year electrical engineering student, by suicide; the April 20 death of final-year Ocean Engineering student Aniket Walker, who was found hanging in JC Bose Hall; and the May 4 death of Mohammad Asif Qamar, a third-year B.Tech student from Bihar, found dead in his room at Madan Mohan Malviya Hall.
The string of tragedies has sparked growing concern about student well-being and mental health at the prestigious institution. (Source: IANS)
