People,

    Day before yesterday Harsh, Mohit, Suneha, and I addressed a SPICMACAY gathering on CURE and the issue of ragging. Though in size it was not a large group (about 20-25 people in all), it was strong group in terms of opinions on and about ragging.

    Not covering the minutes of the meeting, I’ll share a glimpse of it with you. We decided to start, not by engaging in a monologue about who we were and why we were, by initiating an open discussion about the issue of ragging. We gave them an insight into the ugly side and ramifications that ragging has been revealing and asked them if letting the Supreme Court handle this social evil was acceptable to them.

    Despite the fact that this was not undergraduate-students blood (there were professors, researchers, and an even a retired army captain), the heat that the discussion was managing to create was awesome and inspiring. I suspect, had it not been for the tranquil, soothing setting of Lady Irwin College , the discussion might have become physical. As I jokingly reflect upon it now, those people were  “violently” in agreement with each other.

    But it was a good discussion. There were strong, heart-felt views from both sides of the floor. It was reassuring to know that these people actually cared so much as to have an opinion about an evil that they were not likely to be directly affected by, at their age. We’ve initiated the creation of a database of emails of these and other such people with views on ragging: I foresee this as our first step towards researching ragging behaviour.

    There were defendants of ragging (IITians both) who were grossly insensitive about the toll of lives that ragging has taken over the past many years. One of them believed that this loss of lives was nothing sensational and could be equated with the countless deaths that happen everyday through road accidents all over our country. [If any of you would like to respond to this insensitive human being/ animal, I can pass on his email to you.]

    All-in-all, it was very gratifying to find such a bunch of people. We had thought we needed an audience, but they pleasantly surprised us by being the speakers. I strongly recommend that we should stick with this mode (of discussion), until we come up with something even better.

   Besides Harsh, Varun, and Mohit, the architects of this address, a lot of credit goes to Suneha who was not only a major player in finding us this platform in Lady Irwin, but has also volunteered to bring in more female leaders like herself for CURE. That I’m certain shall prove to be a major step in the development and maintenance of CURE as a movement that is integrally a part of Indian colleges, as long as ragging can survive our efforts.

Looking forward to news from you, Suneha, and indeed from the next set of volunteers from CURE,

Dhruv.

  

   

 

 

 

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