A 21-year-old student was found dead inside his hostel room at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Kharagpur on Friday in a suspected case of suicide. This is the seventh suicide case reported at IIT-Kharagpur in the last three years.

This came just two months after the institute constituted a 10-member committee to examine and address the mental health challenges within its campus community in the wake of student suicide cases.

The student, identified as Ritam Mondal from Kolkata, was found hanging inside his room at around 11.30 am on Friday. Following the incident, college authorities informed his father, Uttam Mondal.

Sources told India Today that Ritam Mondal was a fourth-year student of the Mechanical Engineering department. He used to live in a room of the hostel, namely the Rajendra Prasad Hall, inside IIT Kharagpur campus.

After not getting any response from the student till 11 am on Friday, his friends knocked on the closed door repeatedly. They informed the IIT authorities, who informed the police.

After receiving the information, the police arrived at the scene and broke open the door of Ritam Mondal’s room, only to find him hanging by the ceiling fan. Without wasting any time, the police took him to the BC Roy Hospital inside the IIT campus, where the doctors declared him brought dead.

Meanwhile, the family of the deceased student has claimed that Ritam Mondal was subjected to ragging at the IIT campus, which led him to take the extreme step. However, the college authorities have not reacted to the allegations yet.

Police have registered a case of unnatural death and further investigation is underway.

Since 2022, seven students have allegedly died by suicide within the IIT Kharagpur campus. This year alone, four such cases have been reported.

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