Gunshot, Stab Wounds On IIT Kharagpur Student Faizan Ahmed's Body, 2nd Autopsy Finds: Sources

The worst fears of IIT-Kharagpur student Faizan Ahmed's parents seem to have been confirmed by a forensic expert appointed by the Calcutta High Court to assist in the investigation of the case.

According to the second forensic report by Dr AK Gupta, a forensic expert who was roped in by the court, there was a gunshot wound on the upper left side of Faizan's neck and a stab wound on the right side of his neck. The report also debunked the theory that Faizan Ahmed died due to poisoning, something which the police and the IIT authorities had suggested.

Sources have confirmed to NDT the report flagged a crucial omission by the police in the initial investigation of the case. The police, sources said, had not done any videography of these particular injuries during their primary investigation, or while conducting the first postmortem at Midnapore Medical College on October 15, 2022 soon after Faizan's body was found on the campus.

The second autopsy of the IIT-Kharagpur student's body refers to injuries before death, which were homicidal in nature, sources had told NDTV last year. Soon after the college claimed the 23-year-old student died by suicide in October last year, his parents had filed a petition in the Calcutta High Court, saying he was murdered.

Faizan's body was exhumed on the orders of the Calcutta High Court last year in Assam for the second autopsy, after several loopholes were pointed out by a court-appointed expert in the first one. The body was taken to Kolkata by a team of the West Bengal Police, where the second autopsy was conducted by a court-appointed expert.

The Calcutta High Court had come down heavily on IIT Kharagpur for its poor handling of the case. Faizan Ahmed's parents had also alleged a cover-up in the death of the engineering student. While the institute had claimed it was a case of suicide, Faizan's parents had alleged murder right from the time the matter reached the court.

The Calcutta High Court had pulled up the Director of IIT Kharagpur, the premiere engineering college that made headlines for the death of the student on campus. The court on December 1, 2022 reprimanded him for not acting on a ragging complaint, which was followed by the death of the student.

The high court, while passing the order for exhumation of the body, had said a second postmortem was "vital and necessary for arriving at the truth".

Faizan Ahmed's partly decomposed body was found in a hostel room on the campus on October 14, 2022.

The final report by Dr Gupta in the case is likely to be submitted later this month. The matter will come up before the Calcutta High Court for hearing next week.