Two days after the
fee hike protest at the Indian Institute of Technology Indore, another incident
of students’ protest has surfaced in the institute. This time, it is against
mental torture and harassment of a female student in the Institute.
“I knocked on
every possible door of the IIT-Indore community to get justice for my case of
harassment and mental torture. But no solution has come out in the last one
month,” she tweeted, tagging the PM and the HRD minister.
Neelesh Kumar Jain,
Dean of Academic Affairs, IIT Indore, said, “It was an academic issue. The
student who has accused two professors for allegedly harassing and torturing
her mentally, had missed her deadline to submit her scholarship forms with the
institute, and did not adhere to the prescribed procedures. We have set up a
committee to look into the matter, and it will submit its report soon.”
However, students
of IIT-Indore have further raised their voice against the newly formed
committee for not having any female member in it. Students have also claimed
that there is no student representative in the committee, and it thus violates
the Vishaka guidelines.
“According to
Vishaka guidelines, a set of procedural guidelines are meant to be observed in
cases of sexual harassment. The committee formed to address the issue of mental
harassment raised by the student, has a female member in it,” said Jain.
Students of IIT-
Indore had earlier protested against the management’s decision to hike the
semester fees for its PhD students from Rs 8,350 to Rs 19,900. The IIT-Indore
management suspended the fee hike on July 23, 2016, following an uproar amongst
the PhD students against the hike.