The UGC, it is reliably learnt, is likely to send a fact-finding team to look into the two cases of deaths.
New Delhi
Kolkata’s progressive colleges, which have fought for their rights to seek space to kiss in the campus and argued over their choice of professors in their display for total liberalism, have been stunned into silence following the brutal death of a student at Jadavpur University.
Reports reaching here say the death of the first-year student and that of another student from Bengal’s Midnapur district in faraway Andhra Pradesh has alarmed the University Grants Commission.
The incidents have rattled many; former Indian cricket captain Sourav Ganguly said all colleges and universities must ensure such incidents do not happen again. “This is shocking, how can this happen?” Ganguly said on the sidelines of an event.
The UGC, it is reliably learnt, is likely to send a fact-finding team to look into the two cases of deaths. “This is very, very alarming. If it is ragging that has led to these deaths, then it needs to be thoroughly probed,” the official said, adding the fact-finding team will embark on their mission soon.
Medical colleges in India are notorious for incidents of ragging, claim the UGC official. A total of 511 complaints of ragging or hazing were reported from across the country’s colleges in 2021, compared to 219 in 2020, says the UGC anti-ragging cell. Experts have often blamed inaction and underreporting by college authorities for ragging incidents to flourish despite laws against it. Two states, Uttar Pradesh, and Madhya Pradesh, rank high in ragging complaints.
Reports flooding the UGC office here say there has been a mysterious death of a student in KL University in Andhra Pradesh. Officials of the university told parents of the student that their son, Sauradeep Chowdhury, committed suicide by jumping from the 11th floor of a yet-to-be-finished building that housed students.
Parents of Chowdhury have written to the President, Prime Minister, Bengal governor and Bengal CM, arguing their son was murdered because his face had a big hole on the left, almost the size of a tennis ball. “His face was swollen, teeth broken but not a scratch on the body. How come he committed suicide by jumping from the 11th floor and there are no injuries?” his father told journalists ETV News, a top television channel. KL University is based in Visakhapatnam, a coastal town. Officials of the university said they were not in any position to comment on the case. Chowdhury was a BTech student. He died within a month of his admission. A WhatsApp message received by the parents read: ‘Ta Ta, stay well.” And then, on 24 July 2023, the university officials informed the parents of the shocking news. The parents alleged that university officials did not allow them to visit Chowdhury’s room and “were in a tearing hurry to send us back to Bengal”. “It was raining during that time, how come there was no mud or rain marks on the clothes of my son. I was not even allowed to file an FIR, I was not allowed to visit the hostel. The guards told me they did not hear any sound of someone jumping from the 11th floor because they were asleep,” said Chowdhury’s distraught parents. Chowdhury was cremated after loads of difficulties as the cops in Kolkata were not convinced of the death certificate issued by the Visakhapatnam hospital authorities.
So, what happened in the boys’ hostel in Jadavpur University where Swapnadeep Kundu, a first-year student who got space in the boys’ hostel, was found dead naked?
Top sources in Kolkata told this reporter that as many as 12 people—current and former students—have been arrested by the cops of the Kolkata Police. Initial investigations showed Kundu was stripped during an extended period of ragging. “He was told to prove he is s gay, commit sodomy on another student and remain naked throughout the ragging period. Those who ragged him made videos of a naked Kundu. He was asked to participate in a proverbial hare-tortoise race.
Everything was filmed,” said a top source in Jadavpur University. “And then he was told the videos will be put on the social media if he did not cooperate with his seniors,” the source added. First-year students are routinely subjected to ragging by their seniors. They are asked to clean rooms of the seniors, do errands and pass love letters to female students. Kundu, claimed officials of the Kolkata Police, could not handle the pressure and called his parents to complain. His parents, the cops say, probably could not understand the severity of their son’s tension.
Cops say they have conclusive evidence that those who ragged Kundu and some others were planning to hush up the case, but the death disrupted their plan. “A naked body lying in the hostel compound can be terrible news for those in the hostel,” say cops. As many as 45 students and ex-students have been questioned for long hours, also questioned were professors and teachers who are being blamed for “actively encouraging ragging for decades”.
Saurav Chowdhury, a prime suspect, is in police custody. Cops have alleged he was the “mastermind” behind the ragging and actively encouraged his compatriots to erase all evidence.
Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee has called the university complex a dark hole and squarely blamed the Left-wing student unions for Kundu’s death. The incident has also turned into a slugfest between the state’s ruling Trinamool Congress and the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party after BJP leader of the opposition in the Assembly Suvendu Adhikari encouraged Kundu’s parents to seek legal recourse.
The Jadavpur incident, claim some, is now taking up almost two-third prime time on news channels where many former students are visiting the news studios to explain in detail how such ragging continued for decades. The big question is: Why did they not complain then?