Teen\'s death: Students, teachers decry corporate education model

HYDERABAD: Students, student unions and teachers are in an uproar over the death by suicide of a 16-year-old student of Sri Chaitanya Junior College on Tuesday night, blaming the institute and its ‘inhumane’ model of education for causing hardships to students.

With Tuesday’s incident being the fourth such death reported in the recent past, students said the environment in the college made them depressed.

A student, who recently quit Sri Chaitanya College, said that the teachers divide students based on their marks and allot them different sections.

“If we score less, our marks are read out loud in an insulting manner and we are demotivated constantly. We are told we would never be able to clear Neet exams and cannot dream of becoming a doctor or an engineer and that we are wasting our parents’ money,” the student said.

Dr P. Madhusudhan Reddy, president, Telangana Government Junior Colleges Lecturers’ Association, said the college was clearly responsible for the suicide and it must immediately stop normalising its culture of pressuring students to score marks without understanding what help they need.

“Parents must also stop putting their aspirations on their child and give them their right to choose what they want,” he said.

“This college has gotten better at manipulating parents. Before admission they say, ‘Don’t worry if your child is weak in academics, we are here to help and he/she can become a doctor/engineer’. After admission, no attention is paid to weak students and they are insulted regularly for scoring low marks,” he said.

Syed Zabee, a contractual lecturer at a government-run junior college, said that students are mentally tortured, due to enormous parental pressure, and have no outlet to seek mental relief.

“There are parents who want to enrol their child in IT coaching from Class 7. The students are deprived of freedom and are asked to study the whole time. They study for more than 12 hours a day and are also not allowed to use phones or talk to their families. Classes are conducted even on festivals and if a student wants to take leave for two days, he/she must attend the online classes. Students are also punished for talking to classmates of the opposite sex,” he said.

Srinivas Reddy, a government junior college lecturer and member of a junior college lecturer association, said, “There are no counsellors to help students either. Their health is not considered and they are forced to study even when ill. Also, they have bad food and accommodation. There are five washrooms for 50 students,” he said.

Meanwhile, the Democratic Youth Federation of India’s (DYFI) Telangana committee demanded the government shut Sri Chaitanya educational institutes.

“It is not appropriate for the Intermediate Board to take decisions in favour of corporate educational institutions. The educational institution should pay `50 lakh as compensation to the families of the affected students,” DYFI state president Kota Ramesh and secretary Anaganti Venkatesh said in a statement.