Tag Archives: Aman Kachroo

Everyday Life, Law, Violence-Conflict

Point Forty Five

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Dear Mr P. Chidambaram,

On 8 March last year, Aman Kachroo was lynched to death in a college hostel in Himachal Pradesh. It was just another case of ragging. It happened nearly eight years after the Supreme Court of India banned ragging in May 2001. In fact, since May 2001, there has been at least one ragging death every other month, as reported by the English language media. You can imagine how many cases are hushed up, blamed on academic pressure and ‘depression’, and never investigated. We are also not going into the much larger number of cases of attempted suicides, drop-outs, and not even measuring the psychological impact on freshers.

In 2001, the Supreme Court’s orders said that an educational institution that is unable to control ragging would face grant cuts or even disaffiliation by affiliating bodies such as the UGC, AICTE, Medical Council of India and a host of others. Not one of them ever found any college unable to control ragging. Their bureaucrats issued circulars and thought their signatures on the circulars were good enough. Years later, some of them told the Supreme Court that they did not have the powers to act against institutions – even though a Supreme Court order had empowered them to do so!

Such matters clearly concern your colleague Kapil Sibal, so why am I writing to you? We shall come to that, just let me tell you what happened thereafter. Continue reading Point Forty Five →

Bad ideas, Debates, Genders, Violence-Conflict

Where have they disappeared?

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Aman Kachroo is not the first teen to die of ragging. But there is one curious first: this time the death has not led to any ‘public debate’.

This time the defenders of ragging are silent. Who knows, maybe some of them have changed their views and are now lighting candles at Jantar Mantar. There are no TV debates calling ragging fun. This time no one is arguing that a murder case should not be used to defame the socially productive ‘tradition’ of ragging. This time nobody is asking how boys will become men unless they are ragged, and nobody is calling the victims sissies.

What has changed? Continue reading Where have they disappeared? →

Law

And then Suresh Sankhyan wanted to do the post-mortem

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Aman Satya Kachroo, left-most, in his school days. Photo by Vaibhav Chhabra via Facebook

Before he died of brain haemorrhage (and not cardiac arrest as the papers incorrectly claimed), Aman Satya Kachroo wrote a note about who beat him up. In the note he named the four accused who are all now in jail. The note reads like a dying declaration and is signed by 12 witnesses. It seems unlikely that even one of the 12 witnesses will have the courage to say in court that they saw the lynching happening before their eyes. Even as they came down to Gurgaon for the cremation, they must have been getting calls from their parents, ‘Beta, just say you didn’t see anything. Why get into these court hassles and potential threats from the families of the accused?’ Continue reading And then Suresh Sankhyan wanted to do the post-mortem →

Law

Why Aman Kachroo’s won’t be the last ragging death, and what his family should do

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thumbcms1Update 2: And then Suresh Sankhyan wanted to do the post-mortem

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Update: Additional Solicitor General Gopal Subramaniam, who is I think the amicus curae in the ongoing case, says he will ask the Supreme Court to take note of the case and charge the Principal and Vice-Chancellor with “contempt, inaction, negligence and failure.” But who will charge whom for lack of implementation of the SC orders on ragging?And Himachal Pradesh has an anti-ragging ordinance too. (The ordinance had expired in 1998 1992, I gather, as it had not been turned into a law within six months)

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I don’t know why this report does not use the word lynching, because that is what seems to have happened at the Dr Rajendra Prasad Medical College, Tanda. Continue reading Why Aman Kachroo’s won’t be the last ragging death, and what his family should do →