In January, the Supreme Court issued directives on the basis of an interim report submitted by the National Task Force constituted to look into student suicides (Amit Kumar versus Union of India). In this case, the Supreme Court mandated fast reporting of suicide or any unnatural death to the police irrespective of the place of occurrence considering past instances where even elite institutes have attempted to cover up cases to protect their ‘prestige’.
The everyday expression of prestige at academic institutions is often revealed by their interaction characterised by an air of unmindful disregard towards drivers, housekeeping staff and security guards who constitute the bottom of the social hierarchy. This is at the heart of the culture of ‘prestige’ that could potentially colour every interaction, including that with students based on their social identities like caste, religion or sexuality. Thus, Ian Cook writes, “Prestige is the great limiter in academia, suffocating free thinking, experimentation and joy like a heavy fog of stupidity.”
But the practice of covering up suicides to protect institutional prestige is only the tip of the iceberg. Many universities restrain the faculty and the students from speaking up about their harrowing experiences. For instance, universities strictly prevent the community from having access to external communications, including those with the media. This turns an elite university into a ‘State within a State’ through the framing of rules that violate constitutional provisions that guarantee free speech and expression. For any suffering person, the most pressing concern is to be able to narrate his/her story. Denying this very need is an act of cruelty that further restricts care and support networks available outside the hostile institution. The novelist, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, frontstages an important point in this context about the dependence of stories on power: “How [stories] are told, who tells them, when they are told, how many stories are told, are really dependent on power.” By claiming the power to speak on behalf of a heterogeneous community, universities eclipse stories of suffering.
It is important to remember that creating an empathetic, safe and honest space lies at the heart of mental health. One of the easy ways of achieving this is to implement the Constitution’s existing statutory frameworks. Incidentally, the Supreme Court has noted that most of the rules and the committees to protect marginal groups exist only on paper. Very few campus psychologists have spoken up regarding the violation of basic procedures established by law, including the reporting of unnatural death/suicide to the police or the unwillingness on the part of the police to file a first information report.
Mental health is a collective, institutional responsibility. The onus lies particularly with the administration and the faculty. The fact that suicides are not being checked even after increasing the number of psychologists at many institutes of national importance points towards the need for a paradigm shift in mental healthcare towards an institutional culture that inculcates compassion. Paul Gilbert, a clinical psychologist and the author of The Compassionate Mind, reveals that compassion cannot be undervalued as a major instrument for mental health promotion.
‘Prestige’ is a major hindrance to compassion. It stifles university communities from voicing their concerns. Circulars that prohibit external communications need to be revisited by universities to prioritise the well-being of campus communities. The recognition by the Supreme Court that mental health is a fundamental right flowing from Article 21 is a significant step in rethinking mental health as a structural, political and intersectional issue.
Sudarshan R. Kottai is Assistant Professor, Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, Indian Institute of Technology Palakkad. Views are personal
