 "OpenAI whistleblower Suchir Balaji was found dead at his San Francisco residence in November. X - @suchirbalaji / AP")
The mother of Suchir Balaji, the 26-year-old OpenAI whistleblower who died under mysterious circumstances, has said that her son’s death was not a case of suicide and that the company had played a role in his untimely demise.
Balaji, a researcher at OpenAI, was found dead in his San Francisco apartment on November 26, days after he accused the company of malpractice.
In an interview with Tucker Carlson that aired on Thursday, Balaji’s mother, Poornima Rao cast doubts over the current investigation into her son’s death and ruled out suicide saying, “He celebrated his birthday a day before he died. What more do we need to give on account that he was in a happy mood?” He also accepted a birthday gift from his father on the day of his death."
‘They killed him’
A University of California graduate, Balaji joined OpenAI in 2020 and was part of a project called WebGPT, which John Schulman, one of the OpenAI co-founders, said helped pave the way for ChatGPT.
The 26-year-old quit the company in 2024 following which he took an explosive story about OpenAI’s irregularities to The New York Times where he revealed that the AI giant had violated copyright law and products like ChatGPT were damaging the internet. “If you believe what I believe, you have to just leave the company," he told the American news outlet.
Rao said during the interview that she believes that her son was killed because he broke the story to the media. “My son had documents against OpenAI. They attacked him and killed him,” she said.
Mother doubts investigation
Rao has reasons to believe that the probe surrounding Balaji’s death has major lapses. In December last year, she had urged the Federal Bureau of Investigation to take up the matter, expressing a lack of confidence in the San Francisco police department.
“It took them 14 minutes to determine the cause of death and tell me that it was a suicide. In the evening, they returned the keys to me and told me that I could pick up the body tomorrow," she said, adding that the police kept making excuses to her.
Impact Shorts
More ShortsCarlson said, “There’s blood all over the apartment and a piece of a wig covered in blood—it’s not his wig. You don’t need to be a detective to imagine that someone committing a murder might wear a wig.”
Musk reacts
Sharing the interview on X, Elon Musk said that Balaji’s death was “extremely concerning”.
Meanwhile, Indian-American lawmaker Ro Khanna said, “I am heartbroken by your loss. Given your very serious concerns about foul play, I do believe that there should be a full and transparent investigation into the death by the FBI or appropriate agency.”