You can call me Anindita,” she said. Last year she had been a student at a premier college in Delhi, which she had worked hard to get into. Now she is back home, studying at Jamshedpur Women’s College, not willing to speak about what brought her back. Friends hushed Anindita didn’t quite have it easy in Delhi.
Nor did Junaid Khan (again, not his real name), a former student of Beldih Church School, Jamshedpur, who was on a high after getting into a good college in Pune. What followed was a nightmare. On cold winter nights, he and other freshers would be taken to the nearby hills and stripped by the seniors.
If he’s still there, it’s because friends like Arun stood by him. We do not know if he lodged an FIR, as he refuses to speak. We do not know if he has taken note of the order passed by Supreme Court, which says colleges must lodge FIRs against cases of ragging.
But what’s common between Anindita and Junaid is both of them were ragged in colleges outside the state. In Jharkhand, students and most college authorities claim the menace hardly exists and they take great pride in the matter. “Ragging is under control in Jharkhand,” said the national vice-president of the Indian Medical Association, Ajay Singh.
He admitted there was a time when even RIMS had to face sine die due to this malice, but that’s a thing of the past. Awareness level has risen so much, seniors are afraid to speak to their juniors, he said. Amit, a student at Birsa Institute of Technology (BIT), Sindri, agrees. “Forget ragging, we are scared to even speak to the freshers,” he says. Most seniors have realised the implications of being reported against.
At BIT, Sindri, seven students were recently fined Rs 1,000 each for having entered the hostel for freshers without permission. G.Kumar, in charge of placements there, said if a se
nior is caught ragging, he would be debarred from placement.
Prateek Katariya, final-year student at Indian Institute of Mines University (ISMU), Dhanbad, said they are fined Rs 3,000 if they loiter near the freshers. College authorities said they keep strict vigilance at their hostels. As Shivali Singh, a student from Jamshedpur, doing a fashion designing course in Calcutta, says: “In hostels students still suffer.”
Partly because there are not too many such residential colleges, the state has been free of the problem to an extent. And those colleges that have hostels, claim to take full precautions to ensure it doesn’t happen. “Ragging is not easy on the BIT-Mesra campus. Hostel wardens, superintendents and deans keep a watch on the hostels,” said A.K.Jha, deputy registrar BIT-Mesra.
One tried reminding them how a few years ago a first-year student at XLRI had complained of harassment at the hostel. For some time the National Institute of Technology and Mahatma Gandhi Memorial Medical College had been boiling grounds, too.
“It was terrible those days. Now ragging has come down drastically as colleges keep a check,” said Meera Pillai, a third-year student at MGM Medical College. S.S.Razi, principal Jamshedpur Worker’s College, too, said except for occasional reports of eve-teasing, he hasn’t really been reported cases of ragging.
In March 2000, “stop ragging campaign” by Delhi-based People’s Action, Change and Enforcement (SPACE) had sent a letter to the then director of ISMU, professor S.N. Mukherjee, saying they had a complaint from a fresher that juniors were ragged.
Students and authorities deny it. “It is nonsense. Parents can send their children here fearlessly,” said Raghav Mathur, a final-year student at ISMU. “There is a faculty body watching the hostels,” said dean of students welfare, professor P. S. Gupta. In fact, by 10 pm, the gates are locked and the freshers all in — in their safe havens.
NILANJANA GHOSH CHOUDHARY, RESHAM MUKHERJEE & ANUPAM SHESHANK
Nor did Junaid Khan (again, not his real name), a former student of Beldih Church School, Jamshedpur, who was on a high after getting into a good college in Pune. What followed was a nightmare. On cold winter nights, he and other freshers would be taken to the nearby hills and stripped by the seniors.
If he’s still there, it’s because friends like Arun stood by him. We do not know if he lodged an FIR, as he refuses to speak. We do not know if he has taken note of the order passed by Supreme Court, which says colleges must lodge FIRs against cases of ragging.
But what’s common between Anindita and Junaid is both of them were ragged in colleges outside the state. In Jharkhand, students and most college authorities claim the menace hardly exists and they take great pride in the matter. “Ragging is under control in Jharkhand,” said the national vice-president of the Indian Medical Association, Ajay Singh.
He admitted there was a time when even RIMS had to face sine die due to this malice, but that’s a thing of the past. Awareness level has risen so much, seniors are afraid to speak to their juniors, he said. Amit, a student at Birsa Institute of Technology (BIT), Sindri, agrees. “Forget ragging, we are scared to even speak to the freshers,” he says. Most seniors have realised the implications of being reported against.
At BIT, Sindri, seven students were recently fined Rs 1,000 each for having entered the hostel for freshers without permission. G.Kumar, in charge of placements there, said if a se
nior is caught ragging, he would be debarred from placement.Prateek Katariya, final-year student at Indian Institute of Mines University (ISMU), Dhanbad, said they are fined Rs 3,000 if they loiter near the freshers. College authorities said they keep strict vigilance at their hostels. As Shivali Singh, a student from Jamshedpur, doing a fashion designing course in Calcutta, says: “In hostels students still suffer.”
Partly because there are not too many such residential colleges, the state has been free of the problem to an extent. And those colleges that have hostels, claim to take full precautions to ensure it doesn’t happen. “Ragging is not easy on the BIT-Mesra campus. Hostel wardens, superintendents and deans keep a watch on the hostels,” said A.K.Jha, deputy registrar BIT-Mesra.
One tried reminding them how a few years ago a first-year student at XLRI had complained of harassment at the hostel. For some time the National Institute of Technology and Mahatma Gandhi Memorial Medical College had been boiling grounds, too.
“It was terrible those days. Now ragging has come down drastically as colleges keep a check,” said Meera Pillai, a third-year student at MGM Medical College. S.S.Razi, principal Jamshedpur Worker’s College, too, said except for occasional reports of eve-teasing, he hasn’t really been reported cases of ragging.
In March 2000, “stop ragging campaign” by Delhi-based People’s Action, Change and Enforcement (SPACE) had sent a letter to the then director of ISMU, professor S.N. Mukherjee, saying they had a complaint from a fresher that juniors were ragged.
Students and authorities deny it. “It is nonsense. Parents can send their children here fearlessly,” said Raghav Mathur, a final-year student at ISMU. “There is a faculty body watching the hostels,” said dean of students welfare, professor P. S. Gupta. In fact, by 10 pm, the gates are locked and the freshers all in — in their safe havens.
NILANJANA GHOSH CHOUDHARY, RESHAM MUKHERJEE & ANUPAM SHESHANK
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