Editor,
It is really painful to get to know that Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) reports the highest number of suicide deaths by suicide among Centrally funded institutions in India at a time when September marks a global bid to prevent suicide.
The Incidence of suicide indicates a concentrated and escalating crisis within the IIT system. Around 160 students’ deaths by suicide were reported in the past two decades at IITs. Following the eight deaths by suicide in just 30 months at IIT Delhi, students protested over five consecutive days with placards.
If there is prestige over precious lives, IIT should lend an empathetic ear to students worth telling stories for they reveal the complexities of lived realities, kindling new imagination about intervention couched in compassion and an ethic of care.
No doubt, stories matter as they offer profound emotional landscapes for the creation of transformative strategies for healing and system change in IITs.
So, IITs should listen to stories, because listening is compassion, listening is mental health care. The need is an organizational model based on compassion, which can grant ‘permission to narrate’ stories that are antithetical to institutional prestige.
Iqbal Saikia
Guwahati
