IIT Kharagpur is scheduled to host the second phase of an induction programme for the parents of first-year students on November 11, amidst increasing anxiety over student deaths occurring on the campus.
Five students, four BTech students and a research scholar, died between January and September.
A panel engaged to look into the student deaths pointed out parental pressure as one of the causes of stress among students and asked the institute to take steps to curb this.
IIT Kharagpur director Suman Chakraborty said they will hold induction programmes at regular intervals to alert parents and share with them the steps the institute has taken to improve students’ mental well-being.
“The parental induction programme must not be a one-off event. It has to be a regular exercise so we can get to the bottom of the problem and address it through a regular interaction,” said the director.
The first parental induction programme was held on the campus on July 25, before the start of the BTech first-year classes in August.
The second parental induction programme will be held online, said the dean of students.
The parents of 1,500 first-year students have been divided into slots spread over three days, said the dean of students, Arun Chakraborty.
Third-year electrical engineering student Shaon Mitra was found dead in his room on January 12. Three months later, final-year ocean engineering student Aniket Walker was found dead.
Mohammad Asif Qamar, also a third-year BTech student, was found hanging on May 4.
Ritam Mondal, a fourth-year mechanical engineering student, was found hanging in his hostel room on July 18.
A 24-year-old second-year research scholar, Harshkumar Pandey, was found in his room hanging from the ceiling on September 19.
On July 28, a Supreme Court bench comprising Justices J.B. Pardiwala and R. Mahadevan, which had ordered a national task force to identify reasons behind student deaths in higher educational institutions, asked a counsel representing IIT Kharagpur: “What is wrong with your IIT Kharagpur? Why are students dying by suicide at your institute? Have you given a thought to the problems?”
As part of an effort to address the problem, the IIT introduced the parents’ induction programme.
“We are again following it up between November 11 and 13. We are exploring all the options so we can help students,” the director said.
Dean Chakraborty said that while parents would be alerted against applying any additional pressure or expecting too much from the students, they would also like to hear from them on how the institute could improve its mechanisms.
The institute has appointed a dean of students’ wellbeing. The on-campus counselling facilities have been revamped, the dean said.
“In addition to the existing counsellors, there are 10 more such professionals (called Dosts) who move around the campus, interact with students and researchers as friends. During the three-day interaction, we will apprise the parents of the institutional mechanisms that have been put in place. We would again like to tell them they need to be vigilant about the mental health of their children as well and avoid exerting pressure,” the dean said.
In its latest meeting, the IIT senate has resolved that students would not be de-registered for lack of attendance.
“This was done so students did not come under any attendance-related stress,” the dean said.