Five students, including two minors, were arrested under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act, 2012 in Odisha for multiple charges including sexual harassment after they ragged a college fresher to kiss a minor girl. Twelve students involved were expelled by the college in Ganjam district after a video of the incident went viral. Episodes of ragging are on the rise across India, going by recent news reports:
November 18: Five students of IIIT Basar in Telangana’s Nirmal district were booked for ragging three junior students at the institute’s hostel. The five students of Pre-University Course-II (equivalent to (Telangana State) Intermediate) allegedly beat up the three students of Pre-University Course-I and threatened them with dire consequences for not respecting seniors.
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November 11: Seven students of the 2019-20 MBBS batch at Srinagar Medical College, Uttarakhand, forced 40 junior students to strip in the freezing cold on the hostel terrace. The college principal on November 15 suspended the students for three months after college authorities found the allegations by the junior students to be true.
November 7: Kolkata Police registered an FIR after 2019 Commonwealth Para Judo Championship bronze medallist Buddhadeb Jana, 22, was allegedly assaulted in a ragging incident at Jadavpur University hostel by a former student. Jana, who is visually impaired, said he had gone to the New Block hostel to meet a friend and was looking for a writer to help him appear for an upcoming exam when the ex-student approached him in an inebriated state. When Jana asked him to step back, he got infuriated and started pushing, abusing and threatening him, till the victim’s friend rescued him. The Kolkata Police registered an FIR against the accused under Indian Penal Code (IPC) sections 341 (Punishment for wrongful restraint), 323 (Punishment for causing hurt), 504 (Intent to provoke breach of the peace), and 506 (Punishment for criminal intimidation).
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November 1: Himank Bansal, a student at ICFAI Foundation for Higher Education (IFHE) in Hyderabad, mercilessly beaten up a group of college students in his hostel room. He was slapped, kicked, had his hands twisted, and made to chant Jai Mata Di and Allahu Akbar slogans. This happened after Bansal made comments against the Prophet on social media. After he filed a police complaint that he was physically and sexually assaulted, the Hyderabad Police arrested five, while seven are on the run. All of them have been suspended by the business school.
October 14: Faizan Ahmed, 23, a resident of Assam’s Tinsukia district and third-year mechanical engineering student at IIT-Kharagpur, was found dead in Room 205 of Lala Lajpat Rai hostel. Marks were found on his body indicates ragging. An FIR has been filed against unknown persons under Section 302, and results from the forensic report are awaited.
October 9: A Reddit post by a student at the Christian Medical College (CMC), Vellore, went viral. At the college event, Junior Mr Men's Hostel competition, freshers were forced to strip to their underwear before the warden, deputy warden, and a few doctors posing as judges. The same day, students were forced to take a ‘walking race’, around the hostel in their underwear while water from the fire hydrant was sprayed on them. They had to mimic sexual acts with the ground and their batchmates as well. The video, showing two students rubbing against each other, is captioned, “seniors ordering juniors to rub against each other,” while other students rubbed their bodies against a puddle of water on the ground.
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July 2: A Plus III first-year student of BJB College died by suicide, and wrote in her suicide note that she was ragged and mentally harassed by three seniors. Her mother Bidyut Prava Mohanty wrote to the President of India Droupadi Murmu on July 29 seeking her intervention and was told via the chief secretary of Odisha that action will be taken in the case.
April 23: A first-year MBBS student of Bhima Bhoi Medical College and Hospital fell to death from his hostel’s roof. His father Kishan Kumar alleged he was subjected to ragging and mental harassment by the seniors. He had named the institution’s anti-ragging cell as an accused in his police complaint, charging it with failure in protecting his son. Balangir SDPO Tofan Bag, who was investigating the case, said he did not find any prima facie evidence of ragging. Dean of the MCH Dr Sabita Mohapatra too claimed no ragging link was found, a statement the student’s father refuses to buy.
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Anti-ragging guidelines
Meanwhile, on October 22, Delhi University issued anti-ragging guidelines, asking all colleges to strictly enforce the rules and regulations, as well as to enforce the provisions of Ordinances XV-B and XV-C, and the Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition, and Redressal) Act 2013. The guidelines are as follows:
• Drop a written complaint in your college’s complaint box.
• Call 24X7 UGC anti-ragging helpline number- 1800-180-5522, toll-free-24x7
• Contact UGC monitoring agency- centre for youth or mobile number- 09818044577
• Call the joint control room (North Campus) at 27667221
• Call Joint Control Room (South Campus) at 24119832
• Call 112. You can also inform your nearest PCR van
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Ragging is a penal offence prohibited by the University Grants Commission (UGC) and the National Medical Council. The medical education regulatory body states that ragging in all forms is banned in the entire Medical College/Institution/ University, including departments, constituent units, and premises whether located within the campus or outside and in all means of transportation of students whether public or private. The medical institutions are also directed to strictly adhere to the provisions of the Act of the Central Government and the State Governments and should consider ragging as a cognizable offence under the law at par with rape and other atrocities against women and ill-treatment of persons belonging to the SC/ST.
