Yet another student in India has succumbed to the cruel apathy of an uncaring system. The scholar — he was battling autism, a condition that affects one’s social and behavioural patterns — from the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Kalyani, committed suicide after being bullied and failing to get institutional redressal. In a tragic, but illuminating, suicide note that he posted on social media before he took his life, he laid bare patterns of exclusion and violence within the family and the educational institution, raising questions about indifference, even violence, that can lurk within the shadows of two of the foremost formative institutions that shape most people’s lives. In his suicide note, he detailed how such ‘atypical’ behaviour led to recurrent physical and mental abuse at the hands of his parents. It is instructive to point out that a paper from the Rajiv Gandhi National Institute of Youth Development had found that in India, children with learning differences, ADHD or autism experience humiliation and corporal punishment at home. Human Rights Watch also found that children with disabilities are disproportionately vulnerable to violence and corporal punishment in schools and other institutions in India and globally.
This underlines the double burden that those with disabilities — both visible and invisible — face when they do not fit into neurotypical and able-bodied measures of productivity and value. The exclusion of those with physical disabilities, though, is more widely documented — UNESCO reports, for instance, have shown repeatedly how children with disabilities have to drop out of schools owing to a lack of supportive infrastructure. However, unlike physical disabilities, cognitive differences are often invisible. Indian society rarely discusses neurodivergence and, when it does, the focus is on overcoming the resultant behavioural anomalies. As a result, many neurodivergent persons, particularly in professional settings, resort to ‘masking’ — suppressing natural behaviours to appear neurotypical — which is exhausting and adds to their stress and sense of exclusion.
The other aspect that the suicide note highlights is the systemic apathy of educational institutions not only to harassment and bullying but also to students’ mental health. The deceased student at IISER has alleged that not only did he not hear back on his repeated complaints from the anti-ragging cell but also that the students’ affairs council and his PhD supervisor chastised him for not considering the lab’s reputation before lodging a complaint against his tormentor. Even though this is the third time that a suicide has taken place at the IISER — the victims had allegedly not received institutional assistance either — promises of institutional reforms remain unfulfilled.
The steps that need to be taken immediately to eradicate such exclusionary patterns are not too difficult to fathom. Existing laws and institutional rules against ragging and bullying must be enforced and monitored. The toxic culture of fraternity and the power dynamics that fuel such a brutal rite-of-passage ritual must be confronted. The greater challenge pertains to assimilating people with disabilities of various kinds. A fatal combination of insensitivity, shaming, violence and exclusion that afflicts home and educational institutions makes this malaise difficult to eradicate.
