India Needs A Law To Protect Students, Urgently
· Free Press Journal
The death of a student at IIT Bombay by suicide has once again brought to the fore the issue of students taking their own lives due to unaddressed distress. In the latest case, the tragic decision taken by the student, Sahil Wakode, has reopened the debate on whether Higher Educational Institutions (HEI) are structurally oppressive for students belonging to Dalit and other traditionally disadvantaged groups. That student suicides happen frequently in India’s HEIs is enormously shameful, more so when the phenomenon has come up before the Supreme Court, Parliament, and other forums; a Task Force was set up by the Supreme Court, and remedial measures were suggested over the years. The IIT Bombay case is complicated, with some accounts suggesting the student was placed in a difficult situation due to his unethical actions during a test, while a police FIR has been registered on the basis of allegations by his family of caste abuse and abetment to suicide by faculty. No society can countenance thousands of its younger citizens taking their lives each year, and even one avoidable death reflects a colossal failure of the system. As the SC noted last year, suicides have become the second highest cause of death for men in the 15-29 age group and the top cause for women, indicating a serious malaise in society; student suicides rose 65% in a decade from 2013. Some of the findings of the Task Force point to familiar issues, such as persistent social inequalities, structural disadvantage, lack of functional grievance redress systems in HEIs, and barriers to accessing mental health services.
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There is much value in the argument that the extreme step taken by a student should not be viewed as a personal failure but as constitutional dysfunction. As the SC noted correctly, it is not sufficient to expand higher education quantitatively. The challenge is to create the academic systems and processes that make equal opportunity a reality. It is of utmost importance in the case of students belonging to communities such as Dalit, Scheduled Tribe, OBC, Persons with Disabilities, transgender, and rural candidates and non-English speakers. As the high annual toll of student suicides makes clear, the government and HEIs have treated such pointed findings and recommendations as no more than homilies; many lack basic student-support systems. It is high time India changed such a derelict state of affairs. Bringing HEIs under a distinct law to address student welfare would ensure that all institutions create the necessary structures—to report student distress, guarantee remedies, provide augmented instruction to candidates entering with a disadvantage and, importantly, fulfil the paternalistic obligation of ensuring their physical and mental well-being. Caste-based discrimination is indeed a trigger factor for students in some cases, and it must be subject to strict institutional measures. Faculty should be chosen after extensive screening.