What We Must Do to Combat Ragging in our Colleges

The recent ragging cases at the Government Nursing College in Kottayam has sparked widespread outrage.

Dark Side of Ragging in Higher Education Institutes

• Ragging is often portrayed as a rite of passage that helps freshers assimilate into campus life at Higher Education Institutes (HEIs). 
• While healthy interactions with seniors can help juniors learn campus traditions and foster a supportive community, ragging has become a serious issue when it leads to harassment, humiliation, and violence. 
• These incidents can cause lasting trauma, undermining the very purpose of creating a friendly and inclusive campus environment.
• From Tradition to Terror: Ragging should be a way for students to bond and integrate, but it often turns into a dangerous form of harassment. 
  • Tool for Harassment: Instead of facilitating a supportive environment, ragging is associated with violent behavior, creating an atmosphere of fear rather than camaraderie. 
  • Ragging or Criminal Intent?: The negative impacts of ragging have been highlighted by multiple tragic incidents, including cases in Kerala’s Kottayam Nursing College and Kariavattom College in Thiruvananthapuram, which reveal the dark undercurrent of ragging under the guise of tradition.

Legal Measures

• Court Cases and Anti-Ragging Regulations: The Supreme Court issued anti-ragging guidelines in the 2001 Vishwa Jagriti Mission case
  • Later, the tragic death of Aman Kachroo led to the formation of the Raghavan Committee. The committee’s recommendations became the foundation for the University Grants Commission’s (UGC) 2009 anti-ragging regulations.
• Continued Violence Despite Legal Framework: Between 2012 and 2023, 78 students lost their lives due to ragging, and many others faced severe abuse. 
  • The death of Faizan Ahmed, an IIT Kharagpur student, in 2022, is a recent example. Initially suspected to be suicide, Faizan’s case is now being investigated as a murder.

Reassessing the Effectiveness of Current Measures

• Legal Framework Alone Is Not Enough: While anti-ragging guidelines have been implemented, their enforcement remains inconsistent, and institutional culture has not changed significantly. 
• Proactive Monitoring and Cultural Shifts: To eliminate ragging, institutions must adopt a proactive approach that includes better monitoring, cultural transformation, and stronger enforcement of regulations. 
  • This shift involves promoting positive senior-junior interactions and fostering an environment that values respect, inclusivity, and mentorship.

Practical Strategies

• Behavioural Assessments and Monitoring: HEIs should integrate behavioral assessments into their systems to ensure a safe and welcoming environment for freshers. Proactive monitoring can provide insights into potential threats. 
• Counseling Programs: Promoting structured mentoring programs can encourage healthy interactions between seniors and juniors. These programs should emphasize respect, empathy, and peer support. 
  • Seniors who show signs of criminal behavior should be given counseling or face disciplinary action to prevent ragging.
• Using Social Media: Social media can be leveraged to raise awareness about the consequences of ragging, while tracking the behaviour of the students.
• Complaint Disposal System: HEIs should implement a time-bound online complaint system that ensures fairness, transparency, and natural justice.
  • Structural System: It should start with screening frivolous complaints, followed by categorization, issue identification, mediation, and resolution.
  • To ensure transparency and accountability, the names and designations of officials handling complaints should be publicly accessible.
• Other Steps: Colleges and universities need to have a zero-tolerance policy towards ragging and every college should have its own anti-ragging squad.

Conclusion

There is no one-size-fits-all solution to the issue of ragging. What matters is the collective action of educational institutions, students, and society as a whole to create a compassionate and safe environment.