IIT Kharagpur is awaiting recommendations from an external experts committee to specifically “give a thought” to the crisis laid bare by the spate of deaths on the campus, director Suman Chakraborty said on Tuesday.

The director said this a day after the Supreme Court raised serious concerns over the spate of student suicides at IIT Kharagpur and asked: “What is wrong with IIT Kgp? Why are students committing suicide? Have you given a thought to it?”

The director said they were “doing everything to address the growing mental health crisis on the campus” as advised by the Supreme Court.

“Although we are yet to get a detailed report on the recommendations by the expert committee, based on the initial discussions with the members, we have appointed a full-time psychiatrist. So far, we had only psychologists and counsellors,” Chakraborty said.

“The institute will be in a position to specifically give a thought to the crisis arising from the spate of deaths on the campus once the report reaches us. We are also overhauling our career development centre so the scope of internships can be widened,” he said.

Earlier, he had said that a section of parents try to get their children internship offers on their own when they go home during recess, hoping to make their CVs look better, and expose them to “artificial pressure”.

A bench of Justices J.B. Pardiwala and R. Mahadevan, hearing a petition on deaths of students in higher educational institutions, was informed on Monday by IIT Kharagpur’s counsel that the institute had constituted a 10-member probe committee and another 12-member team to counsel the students.

Many on the campus think that the ten-member team of external experts constituted on May 8 intensified its efforts only after a fourth-year BTech student was found hanging at the Rajendra Prasad Hall of Residence on July 18.

The death of mechanical engineering student Ritam Mandal was the fourth IIT Kharagpur student death in seven months.

“The appointment of the full-time psychiatrist will be cleared in a day or two. We are also in the process of appointing a dean of students’ well-being. Additionally, we are overhauling the career development centre so the scope of interning could be broadened and students do not have to undergo stress over internship offers,” the director told The Telegraph.

On July 19, a senior IIT official told this newspaper that students were becoming increasingly focused on building their CVs through internships, alongside academics, exposing themselves to “artificial pressure”.

Director Chakraborty told The Telegraph: “We will use our wide and enriched alumni networks to ensure a decent and steady inflow of internship offers. The IIT does not want its students to subject themselves to any stress. Let them enjoy their study.”

“Let the institute take care of the internships. The rigours of getting into the IIT s
ystem leave students exhausted,” Chakraborty said on Tuesday.

The institute will soon start a series of motivational lectures by former students.