Crime Branch scans CCTV in IIT Bombay student death probe

The Mumbai Crime Branch is analysing CCTV footage from the examination hall, campus and hostel at IIT Bombay to reconstruct the movements of Sahil Wakode, a 22-year-old second-year BTech student who was found dead in his hostel room on September 18, officials said. Wakode, a student in the Department of Energy Science and Engineering, was found hanging hours after he was allegedly caught using a mobile phone during a midsemester examination. The probe was transferred to the Crime Branch on September 19 after an FIR was registered against Professor Suryanarayana Doolla by Powai police on charges of abetment to suicide and under the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes Prevention of Atrocities Act, based on a complaint from the student's family. According to investigators, cameras inside the examination hall recorded Wakode between about 12:30 pm and 12:45 pm on September 18, roughly 15 minutes before the paper was to end at 1 pm. The footage shows him bending and looking toward an object in his pocket before Doolla, who was invigilating the exam, questioned him and took him aside away from other students.