It has been over a week since Fatima Latheef, a student of IIT Madras was found dead in her hostel room in an alleged suicide that has been dubbed ‘institutional murder’ by her fellow students, especially those belonging to subaltern communities. Yet, no one has been arrested so far, despite Fatima allegedly naming three professors in her suicide note. 

Now, members of the Ambedkar Periyar Study Circle, a students study group, have come up with shocking revelations about the culture on campus, alleging that it is not only tilted disproportionately in favour of students from privileged backgrounds, but also tightly controlled by teachers who allegedly expect nothing short of near subservient compliance from students.

According to APSC:

1.      6 other suicides had taken place at IIT M since 2018

2.      The myth of meritocracy is perpetuated, completely disregarding the economic disparities of those who are able to send their children to expensive coaching classes from as early as when they are in standard 8

3.      It is an environment that promotes cut-throat competition instead of a healthy, ardent pursuit for knowledge and all-around development of the students

4.      Students struggle to get PoR positions in various clubs and organizations within campus, to build their CV to fetch ‘better’ placements

5.      A student’s success is measured in the CTC that s/he is offered in the placement sessions

6.      Actual subjects have limited impact on final job offers, the highest paying of which are usually from data analytics companies

7.      Casteism and socio-cultural hegemony allegedly exist on campus with many students, faculty members and staff allegedly asserting their so-called upper caste status through various symbols

8.      Several offices in the administration block and other departmental offices blatantly display religious symbols, allegedly making makes IIT spaces far from secular

9.      Students from economically week backgrounds are allegedly ‘otherised’ and alienated

10.   IIT M allegedly makes no efforts to make spaces inclusive

11.   Students who approach the administration with grievances about this and their inability to cope are allegedly advised to quit the course

12.   Over 2400 students have allegedly dropped out of IITs in the last two years and 120 are from IIT M

13.   This takes a toll on the mental health of students, especially those from socio-economically weak backgrounds who face the stigma to returning home without a degree despite previously making it out of their difficult situations. However, the institution allegedly pays scant regard to this

In a statement released recently, the APSC said, “The entire power structure at IIT Madras itself is ridden with feudal values. The professors enjoy unrestrained power, especially when it comes to guide-scholar relationships. The system rewards subservient scholars. While professors/guides feel entitled to complete subordination from the student, scholars themselves believe that they ought to obey their professors unquestioningly. And the teachers are very much a part of the larger system in India that is casteist, patriarchal, brahminical and feudal. They bring along with them their own prejudices, which could in turn lead into explicit or implicit discrimination against the students.”

The APSC statement further alleges, “That the institute does not treat a student as a respectable individual with dignity is evident from the ridiculous vigilance that exists at IIT Madras. With scant regard to the fact that privacy is a basic right guaranteed to an Indian citizen, the vigilance officers barge into the hostel rooms of students. They audaciously, unabashedly go through his/her personal belongings. The recent incident in which hostel authorities tried to name shame and penalize a student after having found used condoms in his waste basket clearly shows the mindset behind the vigilance system. The ridiculous rule here states that a student is allowed to visit his friend in another hostel, only for ‘academic purposes’! The general rule is that you are guilty until proven innocent, whatever ‘innocence’ means here. How then can a student feel a sense of belonging to this institute?”

The statement finally makes a case for taking mental health matters on campus more seriously saying, Suicides are institutional murders. Mental health issues and depression are systemic problems. They have to be addressed that way. The community at IIT Madras is largely complacent and does not question the status quo. This should change.”

Fresh developments in the case

After a professor allegedly named by Fatima Latheef in her suicide note was forced to step down, the APSC released another statement listing a set of demands for a thorough enquiry into the circumstances that led to Latheef’s death. The statement may be read here:

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On November 9, Fathima Lathif, reportedly a first-year student of Master’s in humanities and development studies (integrated) in IIT Madras, committed suicide by hanging herself. She hailed from Kollam in Kerala and was a class topper. Fathima left a suicide note in her phone in which she blamed a few faculty members of IIT Madras for her suicide. While names of some persons were mentioned, specific allegations against them were not mentioned in the suicide note that she left in her mobile phone.

It has not yet been ascertained what exactly prompted the IIT-M topper to take such a drastice step, her father Abdul Lathif is known to have said that the victim was being mentally harassed by some faculty members. Since Fathima belongs to the minority community, many have reached a conclusion that Fathima faced religious discrimination in the educational institute, some are estimating that she was bothered by her low internal marks, but it is incorrect to reach any kind of conclusions now unless any further evidence is gathered in the case by the police, as the same would be termed as conjecture.

The police had registered this case as a case of unnatural death, however, after having recovered certain “notes” from the mobile of the victim, the phone is now in the custody of the police for further investigation. The father of the victim has alleged harassment and has even approached the Chief Minister of the State to intervene.

Reactions

The reports of the suicide sparked some protests by Students Federation of India (SFI) outside the campus of IIT-Madras and also prompted a hashtag on social media #JusticeForFathimaLatheef which was trending on Twitter. Many Twitter users have alleged that the first name mentioned by the victim in her suicide note is of a Professor, who is being termed as a Hindutva bigot.

Student Suicides in IITs

Reportedly, this is the fifth case of suicide in the IIT-M, this year and this has raised serious questions on the institution’s environment and lack of mental health support for the students. A look at the data from last decade, 52 suicides were reported across eight IITs in India and IIT-Madras tops the list with 14 suicides!

Students who get admission in one of the country’s most premier institutes like IIT-Madras, are meritorious and academically bright and at the same time remain under the pressure of maintaining the good performance. It remains the prerogative of the educational institute, especially one of such a high esteem, that a conducive environment is provided to its students who work hard to get good scores and to cope with the curriculum of the institute. An environment that is conducive to students who stay away from their family should be healthy, free from any kind of harassment, discrimination and one that stimulates their academic performance as well as their holistic growth and development.

It’s time the administration departments of such institutes do some introspection and focus on student’s mental health as one of the important priorities apart from academics.

Related:

With 14 cases in 10 years, IIT-Madras tops list of suicides among contemporaries

Class topper in all subjects but one, IIT-Madras student kills self

Fear of “objectionable video” going viral led Dalit youth to commit suicide, says family

26-year-old found dead, students allege delay, clash with police: Aligarh

India Has The Highest Suicide Rate in South East Asia, But No Prevention Strategy

In India’s Suicide Country, Catching Mental Illness Before It Is Too Late

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In what seems like another step in the direction of an already regressive and discriminatory food policies in campuses of Indian Institute of Technology, IIT Madras has introduced separate entry and exit points, separate wash basins and separate utensils for vegetarian and non-vegetarian students on the campus .

The mess in question is ‘R R North Indian Mess’ which introduced this segregation three days ago. As this is the vacation period, only three messes are currently operational at the campus.  There was no official communication sent out to the students regarding the segregation. To the surprise of students, posters were put up inside the mess, indicating entry and exit points and separate wash basins for non-vegetarian students etc. The segregation has also introduced separate seating space, and separate plates for non-vegetarian students. Also, IIT Madras recently introduced a ‘vegetarian only’  mess to cater to vegetarian students on the campus.

One such student Mohan*, who was not aware of segregation said, “Three days back I sat towards the vegetarian side, I had an egg in my plate, the management came and forced me to sit on the other side, I was told that other students do not like if non vegetarian students sit here, so they asked me to sit on the other side.” Ambedkar Periyar Study Circle, a Facebook page by IIT Madras students, termed this move as  ‘full fledged’ untouchability.

The issue of food choices and targeting of non-vegetarian food has been going on for the last few years. In 2014, the MHRD through its under secretary forwarded a letter to 14 IITs asking them not to provide “tasmic” food and the action taken in this regard was also sort from the Directors of IITs. Earlier this year, IIT Bombay asked the canteen in the civil engineering department to stop serving non-vegetarian food including eggs. Again, the same campus in one of the hostels asked student who have non-vegetarian food to use separate plates.

Currently, students eating non vegetarian food have been forced to enter from other side of the mess, and take separate plate for food. Students intend to take up this issue and  file a complaint against this segregation with the administration

*Name changed to protect the student

Courtesy: Two Circles
 

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This article written by a German professor in the context of the 2015 student protests in USA has equal relevance to our own context with campuses across India in ferment

The protests over race and diversity that shook campuses across the U.S. in 2015 continue to reverberate.

In January the president of Ithaca College resigned. In February Princeton University began public discussions of the controversial legacy of its former president and U.S. President Woodrow Wilson. And also in February, the University of Missouri fired the professor who called for reporters to be removed from covering a campus protest.

Although some administrators deem such students’ demands as fair and justified, others accuse them of revisionist and wrong, claiming “history cannot be comprehended if erased.”

As a German Studies scholar, I am observing the controversies on U.S. campuses attentively. I am reminded of the discussions that students initiated in Germany in the 1960s to overcome the past.

Indeed, looking back at the protest movement in Germany reveals parallels that help to understand the present.

The German burden

Probably no other country has struggled as hard to come to terms with its past as Germany.

The Nazis' unimaginable crimes cost the lives of millions of people, many of whom died in ghettos or in concentration, labor and death camps. Most of these victims were Jewish. Others included ethnic and religious minorities, political activists, members of resistance groups and gays.

After the war, all visible signs of Nazi rule – such as swastikas and portraits of Hitler – were removed under orders from the Allied Powers of the U.S., United Kingdom, France and the Soviet Union.
But that did not mean that racism had been uprooted in postwar German society.

Students helped to democratize German society through instigating public debates on topics such as gender equality, wealth distribution, and the meaning of public leadership. And if necessary, former protesters took matters into their hands and founded their own media outlets such as the left-leaning newspaper cooperation “taz” in Berlin in 1978.

It was students who sparked a public discussion on race and gender. It was they who initiated what ended up being a cathartic process of healing. In the process, however, there was resistance and violence on both sides. The students' targets were clear. They were protesting against universities' failure to remove professors that were known racists and had served in the Nazi administration; against the authoritarian and paternalistic structures at universities; and in favor of equality among the sexes.

In doing so they were targeting the German government itself.

First attempts to undo 12 years of Nazi propaganda

After World War II, denazification and reeducation programs were designed to undo 12 years of Nazi propaganda.

They had limited success.

The Nazis had consolidated their power through centralization and massive organizations. The Nazi Party itself had more than 8 million members or almost 10 percent of the population. The German Labor Front, a state-mandated union whose leaders supported the regime counted as many as 25 million members.

The sheer number of people who had been members of Nazi organizations made the goal of removing them from government and public offices impossible. Many were able to move into high positions in the West German government, and some of those even had the backing of the United States, who considered them efficient anti-communists.
 

Hans Globke. Bundesarchiv, B 145 Bild-F015051-0006 / Patzek, Renate, CC BY

One of these was the director of the Federal Chancellery of West Germany, Hans Globke, a jurist who had co-authored the Nuremberg Laws that revoked Jews’ citizenship in 1935.

Yes, the Nuremberg trials of 1945-46 convicted – in the spotlight of the international media – 22 main Nazi officials, military officers and business leaders. And, yes, there were a number of trials to follow in the 1950s. But it took until the 1960s and the Auschwitz trials for the larger public to be shaken out of its comforting illusion that an economic recovery could continue without addressing the traumatic experience of Nazi crimes and the involvement and passive support of significant segments of the population.

New role models for students

Student protests in West Germany were kick-started by the decision of the center left Social Democratic Party to exclude its student union from party membership in 1961.

The students saw themselves as legitimate political players. They began speaking up not just against the establishment’s decision to silence them but also the establishment’s past.

In their fight against the “lies of the fathers,” students turned to new intellectual role models, such as Theodor W. Adorno and Herbert Marcuse , leading figures of the Frankfurt School of Critical Theory who had been in exile during the war.
But if these “fathers of the revolution” sparked debate, it was often women who took action.

Into the streets
 

Beate Klarsfeld in 1970. Nationaal Archief, CC BY

The political activist Beate Klarsfeld, for example, received major public attention when she slapped Kurt Georg Kiesinger, German chancellor from 1966-69.

Kiesinger had been a Nazi Party member and deputy director of the State Department’s foreign radio network.

It was unacceptable to students that a staunch opponent of free speech could be the highest dignitary of West Germany.

Kiesinger, however, struck back. He introduced an infamous “Emergency Law” in 1968 that only intensified the protests against the government and its representatives.

The law was implemented in May 1968 and authorized the government to make wide-ranging decisions without confirmation or consent by the German Parliament. It gave the government power to strip citizens of constitutional rights such as the right of free speech in case of an armed conflict or a natural disaster.

Students attacked the law as undemocratic and took to the streets. Demonstrations became violent. The deadly shooting of Benno Ohnesorg in 1967 (whose attacker was revealed in 2012 as an undercover agent for the East German Stasi secret police) and of charismatic student leader Rudi Dutschke a year later, brought matters to a boiling point.

In the wake of this violence the student movement split. Most continued peaceful protests. But some, notably the Red Army Faction (RAF), turned to terrorism. It was their kidnapping and 1977 murder of Hanns-Martin Schleyer, the president of the Confederation of German Employers Association that pushed the government into a state of emergency.

And once again the wartime past reared its head.

Until his kidnapping, the public had known little about Schleyer – one of the country’s most powerful business leaders. Now it was revealed that he had been an active Nazi party member, a Nazi Student Organization leader, and a Second Lieutenant in the infamous and murderous Schutzstaffel or “SS.”

The legacy

The RAF was undoubtedly a criminal organization without lasting impact on society as a whole. But the student protests changed the German mindset forever.

Students’ demands to have a role in governing universities were largely accepted. The government increased spending on education, changed curricula to prepare students better for the job market, and introduced Universities of Applied Sciences or “Fachhochschulen.”

More female high school graduates entered higher education. New non-discrimination laws made it easier for women to pursue careers in higher education. In addition, universities lowered access barriers for students from low income families.

Students helped to democratize German society through instigating public debates on topics such as gender equality, wealth distribution, and the meaning of public leadership.
And if necessary, former protesters took matters into their hands and founded their own media outlets such as the left-leaning newspaper cooperation “taz” in Berlin in 1978 – a publication that continues to be a thought leader today despite its relatively small circulation of 52,000 copies.

Other former protesters cofounded the Green Party, now a major player in Germany’s political landscape with an average 10% of the votes countrywide and currently in coalition governments in no less than eight of the sixteen German states. The Green Party’s most prominent member to this day is a former student leader from Frankfurt, Joschka Fischer, who was the country’s Foreign Secretary from 1998-2005.

2015-2016

The echo of student protests in the 1960s and ‘70’s can still be heard to this day.

Yes, there are a growing number of nationalists that oppose Angela Merkel’s decision to open borders to 1.1 million refugees mainly from Syria, Afghanistan and Eritrea. But at the same time, students in Germany have vociferously expressed their support for refugees by volunteering in aid projects, teaching the German language, helping with translations, offering legal advice, and accompanying migrants to medical doctors. More and more universities are opening up their English course offerings for refugees and a new tuition-free university in Berlin is targeted specifically at migrants.

Merkel’s politics, I believe, can be seen as a result of lessons learned by German history. The official response to political oppression and racism, in other words, must be civility and responsibility.

History, much like in the U.S., should adapt to the values of the present, not the past.

This article was first published in The Conversation.
 

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