‘Blue Whale’ claims first victim in MP

Bhopal: A 17-year-old student, suspected to be a victim of the killer Blue Whale game, committed suicide by throwing himself before a running train in the district headquarters town of Damoh in Madhya Pradesh on Sunday. The body of Satwik Pandey, a Class 11 student of a local school, was found on the railway track in Damoh town on Sunday morning, the investigating officer said.

He was the first victim of the deadly game in MP and the ninth in India. According to the police, Satwik had suddenly disappeared from his home on Saturday evening. His father, Sanjay Pandey, later filed a missing complaint in the local police station. “Prima facie it appears a case of suicide. However, we have not yet recovered any suicide note. We are probing into the incident”, the police officer said.

The police suspected that it might be a case of suicide abetted by the Blue Whale challenge. “Satwik was busy with his cellphone for the last several days. He used to remain tense also. He was telling his friends that he had little time with him and he was going far away from them”, the police quoted the friends and kin of the deceased as saying.

A couple of weeks ago, a student in an elite private school in district headquarters town of Indore in MP, attempted suicide by jumping from his school building. The boy was playing his final and the 50th game in Blue Whale challenge in which he was tasked to commit suicide by jumping from his school building.

The physical education training (PET) teacher of the school had saved him by preventing him from taking a plunge from the fourth storey of the school building.