The death by suicide of IIT Bombay student Sahil Wakode has brought the institute’s academic malpractice procedures under scrutiny, with the written rules appearing to require a formal evidence-based process that students say was not followed in his case. The dispute now extends beyond the question of what happened in one examination hall: it concerns how a major public institution applies disciplinary rules, communicates decisions and protects students during moments of acute academic distress.
According to a report by The Indian Express, Wakode was asked to leave an examination hall on September 18 after he was suspected of copying. He was taken to superiors and, according to a source cited in the report, signed a written apology before returning to his hostel room. He later died by suicide. The circumstances are being investigated by the Mumbai Police crime branch, and no conclusion about responsibility or causation has been established.
The immediate institutional question is whether the process followed in Wakode’s case matched IIT Bombay’s formal procedure, dated April 2015. Those rules describe academic malpractice as a matter to be examined through documented evidence and a disciplinary committee, rather than resolved through an apology letter alone. The Indian Express reported that the rules do not mention any requirement for a student to sign an apology letter.
That distinction matters because disciplinary procedures serve two functions at the same time. They determine whether a violation occurred, and they establish safeguards around the student while that determination is being made. When an institution has a written process, the process is not merely an administrative formality. It defines who can act, what evidence must be collected, when a student can respond and which authority can impose consequences.
### What IIT Bombay’s written procedure requires
The institute’s procedure states that when an invigilator discovers an act of indiscipline during an examination, relevant material such as chits, phones or answer papers should be confiscated. The student should then be issued a fresh answer book and allowed to resume writing the examination, according to the text cited by The Indian Express.
The invigilator is required to prepare a detailed note and submit it to the Head of the Department conducting the course. The Head of the Department then refers the case to the Departmental Academic Disciplinary Action Committee, or D-ADAC. Its role is to examine the evidence, establish what type of malpractice, if any, occurred and make an unambiguous recommendation.
The procedure also provides for disagreement within the committee. Members who do not agree with the report may add a dissenting note. If the evidence is unclear, the procedure says that the benefit of the doubt should go to the student. The recommendation is then forwarded through the Head of the Department to the Dean of Academic Programmes for approval and implementation.
On paper, this creates a sequence of checks: immediate examination-hall action, preservation of evidence, departmental review, committee assessment and approval by an academic authority. It separates the role of the invigilator, who detects suspected malpractice, from the committee, which evaluates the evidence and recommends the institutional response.
The reported events raise questions about where that sequence may have diverged. Students protesting on campus have asked why Wakode was not given another answer book, as provided for in the written procedure, and why he was instead escorted out of the examination hall. They have also questioned the reported use of an apology letter, which is not identified as a requirement in the rules cited by the newspaper.
These questions do not by themselves establish that the institute violated its procedure. The investigation will have to determine what happened inside the examination hall, what instructions were issued afterwards, what documents were prepared and whether the circumstances fell within the specific procedure for academic malpractice. But the existence of a written rule makes those questions objectively assessable rather than purely subjective.
### The institutional gap between rules and practice
The report identifies a broader administrative problem: the central administration of IIT Bombay does not strictly monitor how such cases are implemented across departments, according to the account. As a result, the process may vary between departments. Students have consequently demanded a standard operating procedure for handling academic malpractice, particularly in examinations.
This is a familiar governance problem within large institutions. A central rule can provide a common framework, but its actual effect depends on the people who interpret and apply it at the point of contact. In an examination hall, that may mean an invigilator. In a department, it may mean a Head of Department or a committee. If responsibilities and escalation procedures are not consistently understood, the same alleged conduct can produce different immediate responses.
For students, such variation can make institutional discipline appear unpredictable. A student may not know whether an allegation will lead to a temporary interruption of an examination, a formal notice, a committee hearing or an informal demand for an apology. The uncertainty is especially consequential when the allegation concerns academic integrity, marks and future progression, all of which carry substantial pressure in a competitive institution.
A standard operating procedure would not replace the disciplinary committee provided for in the existing rules. Its purpose, as described in the report, would be to clarify how the rules are applied in practice: who can remove a student, what must be recorded, how evidence is secured, how the student is informed, when the student can resume an examination and which office must be notified.
The distinction between a rule and an SOP is therefore important. The 2015 procedure appears to describe the institutional decision-making framework. An SOP could address the operational details that arise in real time, including communication between the examination hall, department, academic administration and student support services. The supplied report does not establish whether IIT Bombay has accepted or issued such an SOP.
### The investigation and the limits of what is known
The Mumbai Police formed a Special Investigation Team to probe Wakode’s death. An officer told The Indian Express that the team had written to IIT Bombay seeking documents connected with the case. The investigation is examining whether the professor involved did anything that pushed Wakode to die by suicide and whether he faced discrimination because of his caste. The officer said procedures followed in the case would also be examined, while noting that procedural lapses are usually handled at the institute level.
The crime branch has recorded statements from Wakode’s parents, classmates and others who knew him, and has collected CCTV footage from the examination hall and lobby, according to the report. It also examined a conversation Wakode had with a friend after he returned to his hostel room. The report said the police would record the statement of Professor Suryanarayana Doolla after speaking to others.
An FIR was registered against Doolla under charges of abetment to suicide and provisions of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act. The investigation was later transferred from Powai Police to the crime branch. The registration of an FIR and the transfer of an investigation do not establish guilt. They indicate that the police are examining allegations that require investigation.
The available account also does not establish whether an academic disciplinary committee subsequently reviewed the alleged malpractice, whether the confiscated material and examination records were preserved, or whether Wakode was formally informed of the process available to him. Those documents are central to determining whether the written procedure was followed. IIT Bombay did not respond to The Indian Express’s questions about the apology letter, according to the report.
The postponement of examinations adds an operational dimension to the case. The remaining mid-semester papers were to be held after the SOPs were ready, according to the report. This links the immediate academic calendar to the unresolved question of how examination misconduct should be handled. It also shows how a disciplinary process can affect the wider functioning of a campus when the institution has not settled what procedure will govern future examinations.
### Why procedural clarity matters on campuses
The case highlights a form of institutional risk that is often overlooked in discussions of campus safety. Safety is not limited to physical infrastructure or emergency response. It also includes the fairness, predictability and accountability of administrative systems that students encounter when they are accused of wrongdoing or face severe academic pressure.
A disciplinary framework that promises an evidence review and the benefit of doubt is designed to prevent immediate allegations from becoming final judgments. If the operational practice appears to bypass those safeguards, confidence in the system can weaken even before the formal outcome is known. Students may then view disciplinary action not as a structured academic process but as an exercise of unchecked authority.
That does not mean every allegation of malpractice should be ignored or that invigilators should be unable to act during an examination. The issue is how immediate action is connected to due process. The written procedure cited in the report appears to allow the institution to secure evidence and continue the examination while referring the case for formal review. Whether that approach was followed in Wakode’s case is one of the questions now before the investigation and the institute.
The larger governance lesson is that written rules require monitoring, training and a clear record of implementation. Without those elements, a policy can exist as a document while producing inconsistent experiences on the ground. In a residential academic institution, where students live, study and interact within the same system, that gap can have consequences far beyond a single examination.
The evidence currently confirms that IIT Bombay has a formal academic malpractice procedure, that students and police have raised questions about its application in Wakode’s case, that an apology letter was reportedly signed even though the cited rules do not mention one, and that the police investigation remains underway. It does not yet establish the full sequence of events or responsibility for Wakode’s death. The next significant developments will be the institute’s response, the documents provided to the investigating team, the recording of statements and the final findings on whether the prescribed procedure was followed.