Bhubaneswar, Jan. 3: Odisha has been found to be third among the states where ragging is still prevalent.

The monitoring committee on ragging set up by the union human resource development ministry said this.

In a meeting held in New Delhi last week, the committee observed that Uttar Pradesh topped the list of ragging-prone states, followed by Bengal and Odisha.

“The colleges affiliated to the Biju Patnaik University of Technology in Odisha are among the most notorious colleges for ragging,” said the report. The report said that ragging was prevalent in medical and associated colleges under the Medical Council of India.

Chairman of the committee R.K. Raghavan said that All-India Council for Technical Education and other regulatory bodies must ensure that defaulting educational institution should be publicised for caution of parents and students.

The state government has written to all the institutions of higher education and technical education departments for sending complete details of such incidents on the campus and the action taken.

They have also been asked to provide the details on the anti-ragging measures taken by the institutes.

Biplab Prakash Mohanty, a student leader of BPUT, said that most cases were going unreported as the institutes try to dispose of the matter by arranging a compromise among the students.

“However there are also cases where even a petty case is given the colour of ragging. There have been cases when dispute between a third-year engineering student and a fourth-year student is given the name of ragging. Such situations must be carefully inquired else it would spoil the career of the student,” said Mohanty.

On February 17 last year, the Odisha Human Rights Commission ordered the vice-chancellor of the Odisha University of Agriculture and Technology to pay Rs 2 lakh compensation to the family of Siba Shankar Ash, a student who became bed-ridden after being ragged by seniors in 2006.

Ash’s father Satyajeet Ash moved the rights commission after his son could not recover from the multiple injuries sustained when some seniors allegedly pushed down the boy from the hostel terrace.

In yet another case, in September the OHRC has taken suo motu cognisance of the alleged ragging of a Class VI girl of Jawaharlal Navodaya School in Cuttack. The girl was allegedly stripped in the classroom.