Goa police have uncovered two empty cough syrup bottles in the room where Suchana Seth, CEO of a Bengaluru startup, is alleged to have murdered her four-year-old son, suggesting premeditation, according to officials cited by Press Trust of India. Postmortem results indicated the cause of death as smothering with either a cloth or pillow. A senior police officer revealed the discovery of two empty cough syrup bottles, one large and one small, during the inspection of the service apartment room where Seth stayed. The post-mortem results suggested the child might have been smothered to death, displaying no signs of struggle. The boy was cremated in Bengaluru on Wednesday, with Seth’s estranged husband, Venkat Raman, performing the last rites.
Authorities are exploring the possibility that Seth administered a heavy dose of cough syrup to the child before the alleged murder, leading them to suspect premeditation. Suchana Seth, founder of The Mindful AI Lab, is accused of killing her son in a north Goa apartment, placing the body in a bag, and transporting it to Karnataka. She was apprehended in Karnataka and transferred to Goa.
Further investigation revealed that Seth had requested the purchase of a small bottle of cough syrup from the service apartment staff, claiming she had a cough. The larger bottle, suspected to be carried by her, raised suspicions of premeditation.
During interrogation, Seth denied involvement, claiming the child was already deceased when she woke up. She had checked into the service apartment on January 6 and left for Bengaluru on January 8. Following her arrest, a court in Mapusa, Goa, remanded her in police custody for six days. The child’s father, Venkat Raman, arrived in Chitradurga on Tuesday night to claim his son’s body after postmortem.
Suchana Seth, a physicist turned data scientist, serves as the CEO of ‘The Mindful AI Lab,’ with over 12 years of experience as an AI ethics expert and data scientist, contributing to data science teams and scaling machine learning solutions in startups and industry research labs.
A police official highlighted Seth’s discontent with a recent court order allowing her husband to spend time with their child on Sundays, adding complexity to the investigation. Goa Chief Minister Pramod Sawant stated on Wednesday that the investigation is ongoing, and the police will thoroughly examine the case.
