BENGALURU: Five days after Goluguri Sai Sarat, a 20-year-old MTech student allegedly ended life by jumping from the hostel building at IIIT-Bengaluru, police are now probing into ‘Blue Whale’ game angle.
“As call records and messages were deleted, we suspect Blue Whale game could have led him to commit suicide. We have asked our technical team to verify what all applications he had downloaded and check his Google and YouTube search history,” a senior police official told Express.
Police said angles like ragging, family issue and financial problems have been ruled out. “Since we could not get much clue through his mobile, we are now suspecting Blue Whale angle,” said the official.
The boy had locked all the apps in his mobile phone and had some of the other symptoms, which hinted at addiction to the Blue Whale game.
“The boy was an introvert and often stayed alone,” the official said. Around 4.40am on August 11, Goluguri Sai Sarat had allegedly jumped off the terrace of seven-storey hostel building. No suicide note was found.
What is Blue Whale game
An internet-based online game, which is basically a 50-day challenge where a set of tasks are given to the players to hurt themselves in real life. They receive instructions from an anonymous administrator. Initially, they are given minor challenges like watching horror movie alone at 2 am or 3 am and posting a selfie taken in the middle of the road. Subsequently, they are asked to hurt themselves and final task will be to commit suicide. This game is available via hashtags on YouTube, Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Blue Whale game was started by Philipp Budeikin, a 22-year-old Russian and so far over 4K people have reportedly ended their life.