1.

Ragging
Ragging is a practice in educational institutions in India and Sri Lanka that involves existing students
baiting or bullying new students. It is similar to the American phenomenon of hazing. It often
takes a malignant form wherein the newcomers may be subjected
to psychological or physical torture. Currently, Sri Lanka is said to be its worst affected
country in the world.

Since 2001, ragging has been the focus of a number of legal actions. For example, the Supreme Court
of India defined it in a judgement as actions that "adversely affect the physique or psyche of a fresher
or a junior student".

A report from 2007 by the Indian anti-ragging group Coalition to Uproot Ragging from Education
analyzed 64 ragging complaints, and found that over 60% of these were related to physical ragging,
and 20% were sexual in nature.

India's only registered anti-ragging NGO, Society Against Violence in Education (SAVE) has noted 7
reported ragging deaths in the year 2007 alone and 31 reported deaths in the period 2000-2007.

2.

Ragging in India
India is badly affected by ragging, a form of abuse on newcomers to educational institutions. The
increasing privatization of higher education has led the academic institutions in India to experience an
increasing number of ragging-related incidents.

Present State
A report from 2007 highlights 42 instances of physical injury, and reports on ten deaths purportedly the
result of ragging: Ragging has reportedly caused at least 30-31 deaths in the last 7 years. In the 2007
session, approximately 7 ragging deaths have been reported. In addition, a number of freshmen were
severely traumatized to the extent that they were admitted to mental institutions. Ragging in India
commonly involves serious abuses and clear violations of human rights. Often media reports and
others unearth that it goes on, in many institutions, in the infamous Abu Ghraib style[2] and on innocent
victims.
In many colleges, like IIT Bombay and IIT Hyderabad, ragging has been strictly banned. However, this
ban has not been very effective, as seen by the number of ragging cases still reported by the media.
Ragging involves gross violations of basic human rights. The seniors are known to torture juniors and
by this those seniors get some kind of sadistic pleasures.

Though ragging has ruined the lives of many, resistance against it has grown up only recently. Several
Indian states have made legislatures banning ragging, and the Supreme Court of India has taken a
strong stand to curb ragging. Ragging has been declared a criminal offence.

The Indian civil society has also started to mount resistance, only recently.

But in India, ragging is more infamous for its ubiquitous presence in the educational institutions.
According to the observations by the Dr. Raghavan Committee, which has been constructed by the
Union Human Resource Development ministry on the orders of the Supreme Court of India, the
medical colleges are the worst affected in India.

However, India's first and only registered Anti Ragging NGO, Society Against Violence in Education
(SAVE) has supported that ragging is also widely and dangerously prevalent in Engineering and other
institutions, mainly in the hostels.

Legislation
In 1997, the state of Tamil Nadu first passed laws related to ragging Subsequently, a major boost to
anti-ragging efforts was given by a landmark judgement of the Supreme Court of India in May 2001, in
response to a Public Interest Litigation filed by the Vishwa Jagriti Mission.

The Ministry of Human Resources Development (MHRD), following a directive by the Supreme court,
appointed a seven member panel headed by ex-CBI director Dr. R. K. Raghavan to recommend anti-
ragging measures. The Raghavan Committee report, submitted to the court in May 2007, includes a
proposal to include ragging as a special section under the Indian Penal Code. The Supreme Court of
India interim order (based on the recommendations) dated May 16, 2007 makes it obligatory for
academic institutions to file official First Information Reports with the police in any instance of a
complaint of ragging. This would ensure that all cases would be formally investigated under criminal
justice system, and not by the academic institutions own ad-hoc bodies.

The Indian Supreme Court has taken a strong stand to prevent ragging. In 2006, the court directed the
H.R.D. Ministry of the Govt. of India to form a panel which will suggest guidelines to control ragging.

The panel, headed by the former director of C.B.I. Dr. R.K.Raghavan, met victims, guardians and
others across the country. The Raghavan committee has placed its recommendation to the Honbl.
Supreme Court, which has given its order on the issue.
Welcoming the Supreme Court's recent judgment on ragging Dr. Raghavan, the former CBI director,
who is the chairman, Monitoring Committee for the Prevention of Ragging, said, “there are finally signs
that the recommendations to prevent ragging in colleges will be taken seriously.”

Anti-ragging movement
With the situation of ragging worsening yearly, there is emerging a spontaneous anti-ragging
movement in India. Several voluntary organizations have emerged, who conduct drives for public
awareness and arrange for support to victims.

Online groups like Coalition to Uproot Ragging from India (CURE), Stopragging, No Ragging
Foundation became the major Anti Ragging groups on the Internet. Among them, the No Ragging
Foundation has transformed into a complete NGO and got registered as Society Against Violence in
Education (SAVE) which is India's first registered Anti Ragging non profit organization (NGO). These
groups are working on issues related to ragging. Each of them is running anti ragging websites and
online groups.

The Indian media has been playing a crucial role by exposing ragging incidents and the indifference of
many concerned institutions towards curbing the act. The Supreme Court of India has directed, in its
interim judgement, that action may be taken even against negligent institutions.

Ragging Deaths
2010

 Nagedra AV, 25, was found dead in Chandigarh's prestigious Post Graduate Institute of
Medical Education and Research on 19 April. The doctor had joined this post-graduate institution
just two months ago. The police said he jumped to death from the hostel building, his father said
he had been pushed. His father said a day ago he had said he was finding it difficult to continue
there due to ragging.

 Sinmoi Debroy, 21, was found hanging from the ceiling fan, dead, in his hostel room in
Chennai on 4 April. It was a private hostel shared by students of various colleges. Most of the 42
SMSes in the Assamese engineering student's mobile phone were threats and abuses from
seniors, who also demanded money.

 Ajub Ajith, 19, hanged himself to death from the ceiling fan in his house in
Thiruvananathapuram on 31 March. He was a student of at the Sarabhai Institute of Science and
Technology. He had told his mother that he was being ragged badly, but prevented her from
complaining to the principal as, he said, that would make matters worse for him.
  Satwinder Kumar, 28, ended his life on 3 March. He was a student of the Advanced Training
Institute, Mumbai. In his suicide note he named seven seniors who had ragged him so much that
he left for home for Kurukshetra rather than take mid-term exams. Before he could reach home,
he committed suicide by throwing himself before a goods train in Rajasthan's Jhalawar district.

 Premlatha, 22, committed suicide by consuming sulphuric acid in the chemistry lab of the B S
Abdur Rahman Crescent Engineering College on 5 February. Her brother singled out one senior,
Yogesh, 22, a fourth year student, as the person ragging her the most.

 Aman cachru in kangra in case of ragging Gaurav Sadanand Raut, 22, strangulated himself
to death on 9 February in his hostel room in Nashik's Maratha Vidya Prasarak Samaj Medical
College. His father named his roommates Mandhar Monde and Anil Kavade as the culprits.
[18]
Although the police detained four students, the local NCP MLA, Vasant Pawar, also the general
secretary of the college body, denied that the student had been ragged.

2009

 Anusha Hyderabad November 5

 Ayan Adak Kolkata 9 October 2009

 On 7 March, Aman Kachroo, 19, a first year student of Dr Rajendra Prasad Medical College,
Tanda, Kangra, HP, India, had repeatedly complained to his parents about the brutal ragging that
took place on the Medical College campus — often by completely drunk third-year students. On
Friday night and Saturday morning (March 6–7, 2009), the boy was beaten so badly that he died
of brain haemorrhage.

2007

 On 18 September Durgesh Shukla hanged himself from a ceiling fan in his hostel room in
Pioneer College, Bhopal. He blamed seniors in his suicide note.

 On 8 August Manjot Singh, an MBBS student, committed suicide by consuming a poisonous

 On 20 September Chetan Raj, 18, committed suicide in Mysore. His body was found hanging
from the roof of his lodge room. He had already complained to his parents that he was being
ragged in his college.
2006

 In November S. P. Manoj committed suicide in his hostel room at the Mahatma Gandhi
Institute of Technology, Hyderabad.

 On 5 November Azad Nair, 22, a cadet at the Officer's Training Academy(OTA) in Chennai.
He had hanged himself from the fan of his room. Prior to his suicide he had told his brother
Soumendu over telephone that he was being ragged and humiliated at the OTA and he had
pleaded to his father Padmanabhan Nair to rescue him from the OTA.

 Ashoke Chaudhury

2005

 On 14 December C Abraham, a first year engineering student, hanged himself to death at his
residence in Hyderabad. In his suicide note, he mentioned that he was not interested in studies.
His parents suspected that his suicide to be a result of ragging.

 On 5 December Sridhar, 18, hanged himself to the ceiling fan in his hostel room in Chennai.
In the English press, only one newspaper in Mumbai reported the incident.

 On 11 October Amit Sahai committed suicide by jumping before an approaching train in

 In July Kamlesh Sarkar, 19, committed suicide in a private hotel management institute in
Kalyani, Nadia district, West Bengal. The police filed an unnatural death case and not one of
ragging.

2004

 On 19 December Mohan Karthik Tripathy,19, hanged himself from a ceiling fan in his hostel
room at the SKR Engineering College in Tambaram, Tamil Nadu. His written complaint about
ragging to the college authorities had gone unheeded. He had been forced to bathe in his own
urine.

 In June, Sushil Kumar Pandey, 18, hanged himself to death after the humiliation of being
paraded naked by his seniors at the Madan Mohan Malviya Engineering College, Gorakhpur, Uttar
Pradesh.

 Aakriti Dhar

 Ehsan Saba
2002

 In September Anup Kumar, 19, committed suicide by hanging himself from a ceiling fan at
his residence in Kanpur. In his suicide note, Anup said that he was going through mental agony
due to the sexual harassment by second-year students of the Institute of Engineering and
Technology, Lucknow, in the name of ragging.

1984

 On the night of September 13th/14th, 1984, TK Chidambaram Raju Iyer, 22 years old, was
killed by his seniors at the Institute of Management Technology, Ghaziabad, Uttar Pradesh. He
was ragged by 4 senior students (Ashok Kapadia, Ajay Batra, Sujit Gopal, and Rajnish Jain), who
remain scot-free to this day. Also, no action was taken against the Director of IMT, Ghaziabad or
the warden of the hostel. Unless strict criminal proceedings are carried out against such people,
the menace of ragging will continue to haunt India.

Organizations

 Stop Ragging Campaign, [1]

 Coalition to Uproot Ragging from Education (CURE), website

3.

Ragging
College life is very important in every body's life because it not only determines the future of a person but
also is a time when most students understand the realities of life. But, do all students enjoy their campus
life? According to the Sri Lankanuniversities, none of the students enjoy their campus life at least till the
end of their first year. This is mainly because of ragging. What is ragging? Does it have any advantages? Is
it important to a freshmen student? Well, these are the questions to which the Sri Lankan society is looking
the answers for.
What is ragging? Ragging means causing, inducing, compelling or forcing a student, whether by way of a
practical joke or otherwise, to do any act which detracts from human dignity or isolates his person or
exposes him to ridicule or to forbear from doing any lawful act, by intimidating, wrongfully restraining,
confining or injuring him or by using criminal force to him or by holding out to him any threat of such
intimidation, wrongful restraint, confinement, injury or the use of criminal force. In plain English, it means
plain bullying a new student. There are two kinds of ragging, one is verbal and the other is physical.
Usually, the effect of verbal ragging is less

Well, does it mean that ragging should be banned? Ragging is allowed in some of the universities as long
as it does not harm anyone. For example, all students are forced to run around the ground in the name of
ragging. It seems to be a fair ragging. Singing, dancing, acting is the another kind of harmless ragging.
After Varaprakash's death the university introduced a system called 'Raggers' and 'Anti -Raggers'. So
students have a choice of being anti ragger and also can be friendly with seniors. But once we choose being
anti raggers, those people cannot rag at all in future. I guess this is a fair enough deal and it will give
students peace of mind.
purpose has changed and everybody thinks that ragging is done just for the sake of spending time. Usually,
after the first year both seniors and juniors become very friendly and they help one another out. Another
advantage is that since there is an ethnic war going on, it is not safe being alone and isolated. Tamil guys
take care of their friends and do not let Singhala guys to bother them. When students start their sophomore
and junior year, they may need help academically also. So, it is very important to bare the torture of senior
students for the first year.
Ragging is a good experience but it has its advantages as well as disadvantages it can be approved as long
as it does not harm anybody. We have to consider the type of person we are ragging and the extend of
ragging. Some students are brought up in a protected environment and other students are shy and having
difficulties getting along with other students. The senior students specially note students like them and
sometimes they are ragged worse than others. Some students do not know how to take ragging easily and
make bad decision about their lives such as suicide. Life is very short and college life is one of the most
wonderful experiences we could ever get. So it is better to enjoy your life without making other people's
lives miserable.