Source: http://www.tribuneindia.com/2009/20090610/main3.htm
Ragging claims student’s life in AP
Suresh Dharur
Tribune News Service
Hyderabad, June 9
Unable to put up with ragging by his seniors, an engineering student committed suicide by jumping before a running train in Warangal district of Andhra Pradesh.The body of Devender Kumar, a 22-year-old MCA student of Hyderabad-based Vasavi Engineering College, was found on the railway track near Dharmaram village in Warangal district, the police said.
A suicide note recovered from Kumar's pocket said he was resorting to the extreme step as he was unable to bear the ragging by his seniors at the private college.
The student’s death came as a stark reminder of the continued ragging menace in professional colleges despite the Supreme Court’s recent directive to the state governments on curbing incidents of ragging. “There is a lack of sincerity on the part of the government to check this menace. The private managements have been routinely turning a deaf ear to complaints of ragging,” an education expert and MLC Ch Ramaiah said.
Kumar’s family members allege that the college management did not take any action on their complaint regarding ragging. . “My son used to talk about the ragging problem. We took it to the notice of the management but no action was taken,” his father Sankaraiah said.
The deceased, a native of Chopadandi village in Karimnagar district, was returning to write his semester examination in Hyderabad when the incident occurred. The police has registered a case of unnatural death and the body has been shifted to MGM Government hospital at Warangal for post mortem. Kumar’s case came close on the heels of the sensational Bapatla ragging case where 19-year-old student, Triveni, was allegedly forced to strip by her college mates. Humiliated, she tried to kill herself. She was, however, lucky to survive.
The ragging incidents continue to be reported even after the Supreme Court took a serious note of the menace and had, on May 7 last, asked all state governments to set up committees to prevent such incidents.
Showing posts with label ragging. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ragging. Show all posts
Thursday, June 11, 2009
Thursday, June 4, 2009
Bishop Cotton Allegations
Wednesday, 27 May 2009
Ragging in Bishop Cotton School (BCS) in Bangalore - 2 Students Leave School
New Delhi | May 22, 2009:
Two class IX students of Bishop Cotton School (BCS) in Bangalore have left the renowned education institute after complaining of ragging by seniors, prompting the state government to seek a report from the district administration on the incident.
The Two students, Akashdeep Turna and Avtar Singh, quit the school on Monday after their families lodged a complaint with the school authorities that their wards were bullied and physically assaulted by seniors, sources in the school said.
Kuldeep Turna, father of Akashdeep, who is an NRI settled in UK alleged that seniors used to send juniors to fetch food for them from hotels at night and did not allow juniors to use toilet after 11 after dark.
He further alleged that juniors were also beaten by rods and hockey sticks if they did not listen
When contacted, the school headmaster Christopher Robinson admitted receiving the complaint from the families of the two boys and said that the school's house master has given him a report on the alleged incident.
"The report has come and I am studying it," he said.
Annoyed over the incident, Chief Minister Prem Kumar Dhumal has sought a report from the Shimla district administration on the matter.
"Immediately after hearing of the incident, the CM ordered the Shimla district administration to submit a report," sources in the CM's office said.
They said though no no time frame has been specified, the district administration has been asked to submit the report immediately.
Deputy Commissioner Shimla Amar Singh Rathore confirmed that he has been asked for a report on the entire episode, which he would submit at the earliest.
The 150 year old school is not the first from the hill state where ragging incidents have been reported.
Educational institutes in Himachal were in news after the death of Aman Kachroo, the first year MBBS student of Dr Rajendra Prasad Government Medical College in March, due to ragging.
Subsequently complaints of ragging poured in from Indira Gandhi Medical College (IGMC), Shimla, Sanawar based Lawrence school and Homeopathic college at Solan.
Alarmed by death of Kachroo, the state government introduced a stringent anti-ragging ordinance.
Seeking to take to task anybody who indulges in the menace, the CM had yesterday ordered deployment of plain clothed police in higher education institutions
Ragging in Bishop Cotton School (BCS) in Bangalore - 2 Students Leave School
New Delhi | May 22, 2009:
Two class IX students of Bishop Cotton School (BCS) in Bangalore have left the renowned education institute after complaining of ragging by seniors, prompting the state government to seek a report from the district administration on the incident.
The Two students, Akashdeep Turna and Avtar Singh, quit the school on Monday after their families lodged a complaint with the school authorities that their wards were bullied and physically assaulted by seniors, sources in the school said.
Kuldeep Turna, father of Akashdeep, who is an NRI settled in UK alleged that seniors used to send juniors to fetch food for them from hotels at night and did not allow juniors to use toilet after 11 after dark.
He further alleged that juniors were also beaten by rods and hockey sticks if they did not listen
When contacted, the school headmaster Christopher Robinson admitted receiving the complaint from the families of the two boys and said that the school's house master has given him a report on the alleged incident.
"The report has come and I am studying it," he said.
Annoyed over the incident, Chief Minister Prem Kumar Dhumal has sought a report from the Shimla district administration on the matter.
"Immediately after hearing of the incident, the CM ordered the Shimla district administration to submit a report," sources in the CM's office said.
They said though no no time frame has been specified, the district administration has been asked to submit the report immediately.
Deputy Commissioner Shimla Amar Singh Rathore confirmed that he has been asked for a report on the entire episode, which he would submit at the earliest.
The 150 year old school is not the first from the hill state where ragging incidents have been reported.
Educational institutes in Himachal were in news after the death of Aman Kachroo, the first year MBBS student of Dr Rajendra Prasad Government Medical College in March, due to ragging.
Subsequently complaints of ragging poured in from Indira Gandhi Medical College (IGMC), Shimla, Sanawar based Lawrence school and Homeopathic college at Solan.
Alarmed by death of Kachroo, the state government introduced a stringent anti-ragging ordinance.
Seeking to take to task anybody who indulges in the menace, the CM had yesterday ordered deployment of plain clothed police in higher education institutions
Punjab actions
Link
Excerpt from Gulf News
Chandigarh: Photos of noted scholars highlighting college prospectuses may be the norm but Punjab University (PU) has made a drastic departure from this practice by dedicating a whole page in its catalogue to the 'baddies' of the institution.
With an aim to curb hazing on campus, university authorities have decided to publish photographs of students who indulge in hazing or other anti-social activities on a black page.
"To deter students from taking part in ragging we will publish the photographs of past culprits in the varsity's prospectus," Naval Kishore, dean of students' welfare, PU said on Tuesday.
"Before taking admission, students have to fill an affidavit that they would not indulge in any kind of violent activity on campus and parents have to take the responsibility of their wards. Otherwise the university would be free to take strict disciplinary action against the defaulters," he said.
Half a dozen students were expelled from the varsity for hazing during the last academic session.
Excerpt from Gulf News
Chandigarh: Photos of noted scholars highlighting college prospectuses may be the norm but Punjab University (PU) has made a drastic departure from this practice by dedicating a whole page in its catalogue to the 'baddies' of the institution.
With an aim to curb hazing on campus, university authorities have decided to publish photographs of students who indulge in hazing or other anti-social activities on a black page.
"To deter students from taking part in ragging we will publish the photographs of past culprits in the varsity's prospectus," Naval Kishore, dean of students' welfare, PU said on Tuesday.
"Before taking admission, students have to fill an affidavit that they would not indulge in any kind of violent activity on campus and parents have to take the responsibility of their wards. Otherwise the university would be free to take strict disciplinary action against the defaulters," he said.
Half a dozen students were expelled from the varsity for hazing during the last academic session.
Sunday, March 29, 2009
Kachru died due to injuries during ragging, says probe report; blames Suresh Sankhyan, school principal
March 28th, 2009
SHIMLA - The magisterial inquiry into the death of Aman Kachru, a first-year student of the Rajendra Prasad Medical College at Tanda town of Himachal Pradesh, has concluded that the student died due to ragging, according to an official statement Saturday.
‘Aman Kachru succumbed to his injuries caused during the course of ragging,’ the statement said.
Aman died March 8 after he was beaten up allegedly by four final-year students of his medical college as ‘ragging’.
Detailing the sequence of events that took place between March 6 and March 8, the report said many first-year students, including Kachru, were subjected to intense physical ragging in the early hours March 7. However, the incident of ragging only came to the notice of college authorities after a phone call was received by the health minister March 8.
‘Kachru collapsed and died due to injuries which the post-mortem report has linked to the incident of ragging,’ said the report.
The report also said that there was no recorded complaint about ragging in the college by Kachru or any of his relatives prior to this incident.
According to the report, about 10 instances or complaints of ragging and acts of indiscipline had been reported in the college since 2001 but none of the complaints drew any disciplinary action.
‘All these complaints were handled in a casual manner by college authorities and not a single instance showed any effective step or punitive action taken to curb the menace,’ it said.
The report held college principal Suresh Sankhyan, who resigned from the post after the ragging incident, responsible for the lapses.
The report has been submitted to the state’s principal secretary (health), the principal secretary (education) and the director general of police for action.
SHIMLA - The magisterial inquiry into the death of Aman Kachru, a first-year student of the Rajendra Prasad Medical College at Tanda town of Himachal Pradesh, has concluded that the student died due to ragging, according to an official statement Saturday.
‘Aman Kachru succumbed to his injuries caused during the course of ragging,’ the statement said.
Aman died March 8 after he was beaten up allegedly by four final-year students of his medical college as ‘ragging’.
Detailing the sequence of events that took place between March 6 and March 8, the report said many first-year students, including Kachru, were subjected to intense physical ragging in the early hours March 7. However, the incident of ragging only came to the notice of college authorities after a phone call was received by the health minister March 8.
‘Kachru collapsed and died due to injuries which the post-mortem report has linked to the incident of ragging,’ said the report.
The report also said that there was no recorded complaint about ragging in the college by Kachru or any of his relatives prior to this incident.
According to the report, about 10 instances or complaints of ragging and acts of indiscipline had been reported in the college since 2001 but none of the complaints drew any disciplinary action.
‘All these complaints were handled in a casual manner by college authorities and not a single instance showed any effective step or punitive action taken to curb the menace,’ it said.
The report held college principal Suresh Sankhyan, who resigned from the post after the ragging incident, responsible for the lapses.
The report has been submitted to the state’s principal secretary (health), the principal secretary (education) and the director general of police for action.
Saturday, March 28, 2009
Hank Nuwer commentary on ragging: Sunday Times of India
from the Sunday Times of India
How US failed to deal with ragging
29 Mar 2009, 0252 hrs IST, Hank Nuwer
India’s national disgrace with ragging is more common in many industrial countries than even journalists realize.
Japan has vicious sumo wrestler initiations, one newcomer beaten to death by three older wrestlers not long ago. Beatings similar to ragging recently have resulted in killings in the Philippines, Indonesia and the United States.
In the latter three countries ragging is called hazing, the term apparently taken from the old American West for the practice of controlling stock animals. The word ‘hazing’ was later appropriated in the Wild West for the ridicule and rough jokes forced on newcomers called ‘greenhorns.’
Unfortunately, while awareness of hazing in the US media has never been higher, deaths from fraternity and, to a much lesser degree, sorority hazing have continued unabated for 30 years.
The first male fraternity man to die was the son of a former Civil War general at Cornell University in 1873. America has had at least one hazing death — and sometimes many deaths — every year from 1970 to 2009, according to my research.
These pledges or so-called ‘associate members’ die mainly from alcohol poisoning and beatings, but sometimes they die in bizarre ways, including burning to death, drowning, choking on forced substances and getting hit by drunk drivers.
Worse, with a few exceptions, educational programmes to address hazing in American secondary schools before college are mainly non-existent or hastily planned only after an incident occurs.
While high school students do not often die from beatings, they do endure pummelling, paddling, and worse, sexual abuse ending in rectal tearing from objects such as pens and brooms inserted by their gleeful, sadistic peers. Two football players from a small New Mexico town pleaded guilty in recent days to sodomizing a so-called ‘rookie’ teammate.
These high-school hazers take inspiration from American professional athletes who delight in tormenting, humiliating and savagely beating rookies — many of these incidents being treated as humorous and part of the game by US sportswriters.
Moreover, the hazing frenzy in North America is not limited to the US. Canada’s junior hockey programme has seen newcomers subject to sexual abuse, and one rookie quit McGill University’s football programme amid claims he was sexually hazed.
And beatings and sexual abuse during initiations in prestigious South African secondary academies have only recently sparked parents and concerned citizens to begin campaigns similar to India’s anti-ragging efforts to force school administrators to ban all such so-called ‘welcoming’ activities.
India’s attempts to impose a lifetime ban on those caught ragging is admirable (though likely to have educators mired in appeals and litigation), but if bans in the US are any indication, they are doomed to failure. Hazing used to be practiced out in the open in the US, but when perpetrators faced expulsion from school and fraternity, plus misdemeanor or felony hazing charges, they took the practice underground.
Beatings continued in secrecy, particularly in African-American and Latino groups that admire warrior ability to endure pain and sacrifice. Coerced alcohol initiations among international, national and local fraternities and sororities not only escalated but they evolved into creative games. This month a young sorority woman pleaded guilty to giving a fraternity pledge at Utah State University a fatal administering of booze during a games session. Supposedly it was a ‘reward’ for the pledge to be hazed by women instead of fraternity brothers for one night.
Is there anything that can be done about practices such as ragging and hazing other than throwing one’s hands up in disgust and outrage?
I think there is. Having written and studied about hazing since 1975, after a hazing death occurred at the Nevada University where I attended graduate school, i believe these are positive developments in the US:
National and international fraternities and sororities themselves have come down hard on hazers, expelling individual and individual chapters caught violating rules.
National organizations such as HazingPrevention.org and Stophazing.org provide educational programmes, as do risk management corporations such as the Human Equation which provides online anti-hazing educational courses.
Criminal laws gradually have been tightened state by state, mainly because the parents of dead victims have lobbied hard for felony hazing charges in states like Florida and California. Civil litigation (including awards of US$14 million) also serves as a deterrent — at least to the elders who are university administrators or fraternity officials.
But in the end, it is going to take a paradigm shift where young people themselves begin to universally condemn hazing before true reform can be expected to become the reality.
And even if a decrease in ragging/hazing does occur due to toughened national laws in India and the US and elsewhere, i have no doubt hazing will crop up again among students sometime in the future.
As i have written in my books, Wrongs of Passage and the Hazing Reader, hazing and ragging are indeed a weed in the Garden of Academe. Stamp it out in one quadrangle and it flares up again in the next. More than a weed, hazing and ragging are a true scourge, allowing us to see in our young people the kind of viciousness that erupted in the Americans holding pens for prisoners of war at Abu Ghraib.
Only when our young people gain a respect for human rights will these vicious human rites truly disappear. I pray they do disappear, but my research demonstrates that it will not disappear altogether in my lifetime, or in the lifetime of anyone reading this commentary.
And that is a sad commentary on human affairs indeed.
Hank Nuwer is a professor at Indiana University (retired from IUPUI: now with Franklin College) in the US and has written four books on hazing.
How US failed to deal with ragging
29 Mar 2009, 0252 hrs IST, Hank Nuwer
India’s national disgrace with ragging is more common in many industrial countries than even journalists realize.
Japan has vicious sumo wrestler initiations, one newcomer beaten to death by three older wrestlers not long ago. Beatings similar to ragging recently have resulted in killings in the Philippines, Indonesia and the United States.
In the latter three countries ragging is called hazing, the term apparently taken from the old American West for the practice of controlling stock animals. The word ‘hazing’ was later appropriated in the Wild West for the ridicule and rough jokes forced on newcomers called ‘greenhorns.’
Unfortunately, while awareness of hazing in the US media has never been higher, deaths from fraternity and, to a much lesser degree, sorority hazing have continued unabated for 30 years.
The first male fraternity man to die was the son of a former Civil War general at Cornell University in 1873. America has had at least one hazing death — and sometimes many deaths — every year from 1970 to 2009, according to my research.
These pledges or so-called ‘associate members’ die mainly from alcohol poisoning and beatings, but sometimes they die in bizarre ways, including burning to death, drowning, choking on forced substances and getting hit by drunk drivers.
Worse, with a few exceptions, educational programmes to address hazing in American secondary schools before college are mainly non-existent or hastily planned only after an incident occurs.
While high school students do not often die from beatings, they do endure pummelling, paddling, and worse, sexual abuse ending in rectal tearing from objects such as pens and brooms inserted by their gleeful, sadistic peers. Two football players from a small New Mexico town pleaded guilty in recent days to sodomizing a so-called ‘rookie’ teammate.
These high-school hazers take inspiration from American professional athletes who delight in tormenting, humiliating and savagely beating rookies — many of these incidents being treated as humorous and part of the game by US sportswriters.
Moreover, the hazing frenzy in North America is not limited to the US. Canada’s junior hockey programme has seen newcomers subject to sexual abuse, and one rookie quit McGill University’s football programme amid claims he was sexually hazed.
And beatings and sexual abuse during initiations in prestigious South African secondary academies have only recently sparked parents and concerned citizens to begin campaigns similar to India’s anti-ragging efforts to force school administrators to ban all such so-called ‘welcoming’ activities.
India’s attempts to impose a lifetime ban on those caught ragging is admirable (though likely to have educators mired in appeals and litigation), but if bans in the US are any indication, they are doomed to failure. Hazing used to be practiced out in the open in the US, but when perpetrators faced expulsion from school and fraternity, plus misdemeanor or felony hazing charges, they took the practice underground.
Beatings continued in secrecy, particularly in African-American and Latino groups that admire warrior ability to endure pain and sacrifice. Coerced alcohol initiations among international, national and local fraternities and sororities not only escalated but they evolved into creative games. This month a young sorority woman pleaded guilty to giving a fraternity pledge at Utah State University a fatal administering of booze during a games session. Supposedly it was a ‘reward’ for the pledge to be hazed by women instead of fraternity brothers for one night.
Is there anything that can be done about practices such as ragging and hazing other than throwing one’s hands up in disgust and outrage?
I think there is. Having written and studied about hazing since 1975, after a hazing death occurred at the Nevada University where I attended graduate school, i believe these are positive developments in the US:
National and international fraternities and sororities themselves have come down hard on hazers, expelling individual and individual chapters caught violating rules.
National organizations such as HazingPrevention.org and Stophazing.org provide educational programmes, as do risk management corporations such as the Human Equation which provides online anti-hazing educational courses.
Criminal laws gradually have been tightened state by state, mainly because the parents of dead victims have lobbied hard for felony hazing charges in states like Florida and California. Civil litigation (including awards of US$14 million) also serves as a deterrent — at least to the elders who are university administrators or fraternity officials.
But in the end, it is going to take a paradigm shift where young people themselves begin to universally condemn hazing before true reform can be expected to become the reality.
And even if a decrease in ragging/hazing does occur due to toughened national laws in India and the US and elsewhere, i have no doubt hazing will crop up again among students sometime in the future.
As i have written in my books, Wrongs of Passage and the Hazing Reader, hazing and ragging are indeed a weed in the Garden of Academe. Stamp it out in one quadrangle and it flares up again in the next. More than a weed, hazing and ragging are a true scourge, allowing us to see in our young people the kind of viciousness that erupted in the Americans holding pens for prisoners of war at Abu Ghraib.
Only when our young people gain a respect for human rights will these vicious human rites truly disappear. I pray they do disappear, but my research demonstrates that it will not disappear altogether in my lifetime, or in the lifetime of anyone reading this commentary.
And that is a sad commentary on human affairs indeed.
Hank Nuwer is a professor at Indiana University (retired from IUPUI: now with Franklin College) in the US and has written four books on hazing.
Thursday, March 26, 2009
from Stopragging.org
Where have the ragging defenders disappeared?
Published March 26, 2009 2008-09
Author: Shivam Vij
Aman Kachroo is not the first teen to die of ragging. But there is one curious first: this time the death has not led to any ‘public debate’.
This time the defenders of ragging are silent. Who knows, maybe some of them have changed their views and are now lighting candles at Jantar Mantar. There are no TV debates calling ragging fun. This time no one is arguing that a murder case should not be used to defame the socially productive ‘tradition’ of ragging. This time nobody is asking how boys will become men unless they are ragged, and nobody is calling the victims sissies.
What has changed? Have the chickens come home to roost? DPS, Gurgaon, Kashmiri Pandit — have the defenders shut up because the victim was a ‘person like us’? Is that all it needed, the life of a metro-bred boy rather than a small-town loser? Has the debate, that should have been settled with the Supreme Court’s 2001 ban, finally been settled 8 years and two dozen deaths later?
It sounds crude but it’s true: Aman Kachroo was lucky to be murdered than forced to commit suicide like most others. Had he committed suicide, the world would have been blaming him rather than his seniors. Nine out of 10 ragging suicides are by freshers who hang themselves from the ceiling fan of their hostel room, rarely leaving a suicide note. In all these cases, the victim is blamed. Must be depression. Exams? Relationship? Family discord? But since Aman was literally lynched to death, the standard template can’t be used this time.
Ragging continues because society at large wants it to continue despite legal injunctures. In an essay where he recounts ragging in Delhi University, Amitav Ghosh writes, “There were nights when we slept in drainpipes around Pandara Park rather than go back to college to face our seniors.” The rest of the essay convinces you that had it not been for ragging he wouldn’t have become the writer that he is!
That’s the manner in which selective amnesia is applied. Such mythmaking is then reflected in TV debates, newspaper features, and in the portrayal of ragging in films such as Munnabhai MBBS. The images you get to see are not of young bodies hanging from fans, eyes bulging and tongues popping out, but those of day-scholars singing and dancing in the canteen.
The most important arena of legitimising ragging is the oral passing-on of stories of parents to children, from alumni to students. A practice that teaches you to submit, to be subjugated and humiliated rather than to refuse orders becomes a ritual.
And so it is that when a student commits suicide, the first response of many is that if hundreds of other students in their same hostel didn’t commit suicide, why did this one? The ensuing victim-blaming makes sure ragging survives. The media’s focus on ragging ‘cases’ rather than the everyday goings-on in hostels also makes sure that the cases are seen as exceptions. The student who drops out, or becomes mentally unstable, or is ostracised by his/her hostel community for complaining are not highlighted. Even the family and peers begin stereotyping them as ‘shy’ and ‘timid’.
In 2002, Anoop Kumar committed suicide in a Lucknow college because his parents won’t let him drop out and return home to Kanpur. He had told his parents that he couldn’t even tell them what he was being subjected to. It was the shame of sexual abuse. It’s amazing that a society that does not approve of homosexuality looks the other way at sexual ragging. His parents regretted their stubbornness just as Aman’s parents regretted not taking their sons protestations seriously.
The regret of Aman’s parents is just as well the regret of the defenders. For the first time, contempt notices have been issued to principals and the University Grants Commission is pretending to wake up. The evidence is so strong that the four seniors could make history by being the first to be convicted of ragging death. Most of all, when a new government comes to power, it will hopefully look into the Raghavan Committee’s 50 recommendations and, at the very least, amend the Indian Penal Code to make ragging an offence.
(An edited, shorter version of this article by me appeared this past Sunday in the Hindustan Times.)
Published March 26, 2009 2008-09
Author: Shivam Vij
Aman Kachroo is not the first teen to die of ragging. But there is one curious first: this time the death has not led to any ‘public debate’.
This time the defenders of ragging are silent. Who knows, maybe some of them have changed their views and are now lighting candles at Jantar Mantar. There are no TV debates calling ragging fun. This time no one is arguing that a murder case should not be used to defame the socially productive ‘tradition’ of ragging. This time nobody is asking how boys will become men unless they are ragged, and nobody is calling the victims sissies.
What has changed? Have the chickens come home to roost? DPS, Gurgaon, Kashmiri Pandit — have the defenders shut up because the victim was a ‘person like us’? Is that all it needed, the life of a metro-bred boy rather than a small-town loser? Has the debate, that should have been settled with the Supreme Court’s 2001 ban, finally been settled 8 years and two dozen deaths later?
It sounds crude but it’s true: Aman Kachroo was lucky to be murdered than forced to commit suicide like most others. Had he committed suicide, the world would have been blaming him rather than his seniors. Nine out of 10 ragging suicides are by freshers who hang themselves from the ceiling fan of their hostel room, rarely leaving a suicide note. In all these cases, the victim is blamed. Must be depression. Exams? Relationship? Family discord? But since Aman was literally lynched to death, the standard template can’t be used this time.
Ragging continues because society at large wants it to continue despite legal injunctures. In an essay where he recounts ragging in Delhi University, Amitav Ghosh writes, “There were nights when we slept in drainpipes around Pandara Park rather than go back to college to face our seniors.” The rest of the essay convinces you that had it not been for ragging he wouldn’t have become the writer that he is!
That’s the manner in which selective amnesia is applied. Such mythmaking is then reflected in TV debates, newspaper features, and in the portrayal of ragging in films such as Munnabhai MBBS. The images you get to see are not of young bodies hanging from fans, eyes bulging and tongues popping out, but those of day-scholars singing and dancing in the canteen.
The most important arena of legitimising ragging is the oral passing-on of stories of parents to children, from alumni to students. A practice that teaches you to submit, to be subjugated and humiliated rather than to refuse orders becomes a ritual.
And so it is that when a student commits suicide, the first response of many is that if hundreds of other students in their same hostel didn’t commit suicide, why did this one? The ensuing victim-blaming makes sure ragging survives. The media’s focus on ragging ‘cases’ rather than the everyday goings-on in hostels also makes sure that the cases are seen as exceptions. The student who drops out, or becomes mentally unstable, or is ostracised by his/her hostel community for complaining are not highlighted. Even the family and peers begin stereotyping them as ‘shy’ and ‘timid’.
In 2002, Anoop Kumar committed suicide in a Lucknow college because his parents won’t let him drop out and return home to Kanpur. He had told his parents that he couldn’t even tell them what he was being subjected to. It was the shame of sexual abuse. It’s amazing that a society that does not approve of homosexuality looks the other way at sexual ragging. His parents regretted their stubbornness just as Aman’s parents regretted not taking their sons protestations seriously.
The regret of Aman’s parents is just as well the regret of the defenders. For the first time, contempt notices have been issued to principals and the University Grants Commission is pretending to wake up. The evidence is so strong that the four seniors could make history by being the first to be convicted of ragging death. Most of all, when a new government comes to power, it will hopefully look into the Raghavan Committee’s 50 recommendations and, at the very least, amend the Indian Penal Code to make ragging an offence.
(An edited, shorter version of this article by me appeared this past Sunday in the Hindustan Times.)
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