Engineering student’s body recovered from pond

Mystery shrouds the death of an engineering student of Haldia Institute of technology, whose body was recovered from a pond near a college at Hatiberia village on Thursday morning. 

Police said the victim, Sugandh Raj, who was missing for the past two days following a clash with seniors, was originally a resident of Bihar. 

A scuffle broke out between junior and senior students of the college after the former protested against ragging of a student on Tuesday. The scuffle took place somewhere outside the campus. Later they had once again got engaged into a fight at hostel. 

Some students of all the three years, however, went out of the hostel on Wednesday night. All of them went to a local village and again a fight broke out between them in which some of them were injured. 

After getting information, policemen rushed to the spot and brought the situation under control. The trouble continued till late night. The police later detained 10 students for creating chaos in the area. But all were released on Wednesday. It is learnt that the Raj, who was a first year student of Instrumentation and Control Engineering, was missing. 

His friends searched him desperately, but they failed to find him. The college administration was also informed by his friends and the hostel authorities. 

On Thursday morning, local people saw a body floating in the pond adjacent to Arun Chandra High School. A few students of the college also rushed to the spot after they came to know about the matter. 

They identified Raj’s body, which was sent for post-mortem. The college administration lodged a complaint with the police. The victim’s family members were also informed. 

Police said a probe had been initiated. But they are yet to ascertain the exact reason which led to his death. 

A police officer said: “The post-mortem report is quite essential to get answers to certain questions relevant to the investigation. First of all it is important to know whether there was any injury marks on his body, which may suggest that he was thrown into the pond after being beaten up. It could also be that he had accidentally fell into the pond and drowned.”

Local people have raised their displeasure over the college management alleging that they do not have control over the students. 

A villager raised a question that “how can the students come out from their hostel at night?”