25-year old techie found dead in Bengaluru, allegations of toxic work culture emerge
PTC News Desk: A 25-year-old AI engineer was found dead in Bengaluru’s Agara Lake nearly two weeks after his death. Following his death, several reports are doing rounds on social media indicating that he died by suicide due to toxic workplace culture.
The deceased has been identified as Nikhil Somwanshi who was a machine learning engineer at Ola's artificial intelligence startup Krutrim. The body was found on May 8, and an FIR was filed to investigate the matter.
As per Somwanshi’s LinkedIn profile, he had previously worked on a large language model and retrieval-augmented generation-based chatbot called Sathi as part of his master’s thesis, funded by the Melinda Gates Foundation.
The reports suggest that Nikhil was under severe pressure due to exploitative manager and unhealthy work culture. A user, posting under the handle Kirgawakutzo, alleged that the US-based manager Rajkiran Panuganti used “traumatic” language with subordinates, fostering a hostile and psychologically unsafe environment that led to multiple resignations.
The reports also indicate distressing claims from current as well as former employees describing Panuganti as verbally abusive. Another employee said that he resigned without having any other job offer in hand owing to the intense work pressure, saying they had even experienced suicidal thoughts as a result.
Meanwhile the company said that it granted Nikhil's leave request in which he expressed need for rest.
“He reached out to his manager on April 8, expressing a need for rest. His request was immediately granted. On April 17, he shared that he was feeling better but would benefit from more time off, which was approved,” the company said.
- PTC NEWS
