Hyderabad, Aug. 23: The desperate call for help flashed on the screen. It was clear the young woman was terrified.

“I am getting obnoxious calls from my classmates. Please help. I am scared of being alone at home. They even threaten to come home if I complain to authorities.”

Sunita Ram’s cry for help after being ragged by seniors at Hyderabad’s Gandhi Medical College is not the only complaint the official website of the directorate of medical education in Andhra Pradesh has received over the past few weeks.

Another complaint from Kakinada, about 450 km from Hyderabad, described how seniors harassed Parvati Chenubotla in a classroom where she was asked to dance like pop diva Janet Jackson and movie star Jennifer Lopez. “I was also asked to dance in my underclothes like (singer) Madonna,” the student of Kasturba Gandhi Medical College said.

Authorities claimed that police acted on both complaints by placing watchers in the institutions and, with the help of decoys, caught four boys and two senior girls. Sources said the website — http:\\dme.ap.nic.in — has registered over 100 hits since being installed recently.

Anjana Sinha, the chief of the women protection cell of the city police, said decoys have been placed in educational institutions across the state. “All we need is an indication of what is happening where. Rest we know how to handle,” she added.

Culprits can be punished with rigorous imprisonment for three months or slapped a fine of Rs 5,000, but courts have usually shown a degree of leniency keeping in mind their age and career. In most cases, a compromise was reached.

The website was set up after three suicides — two of them by medical students — last year. Seven aspiring doctors also attempted suicide while 72 nearly gave up studies after the ragging turned unbearable.

“We want to ensure that such incidents take a back seat in our institutions,” said M.V. Ramana, a software engineer in the directorate of medical education and the innovator of the program.

The website guarantees confidentiality and is also safe from hackers, said Dr R. Shashi Prabha, the new director of medical education in Andhra. “The victim could fill up a complaint form in the site and leave the rest to authorities.”

The complaints, which can be accessed only by the director of medical education, are then analysed and brought to the notice of psychologists and the police.

But it is not only college freshers who have emailed complaints. Working women, too, have registered their grievances.

“We have taken prompt action in at least 12 instances of ragging and eve-teasing of working women,” Prabha said.

With the counselling period for professional courses coming to an end, vigilance squads from the women protection force and the CID are keeping watch in educational institutions in the city as well as in other places.