[GK] Senior Junior harmony

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SYED TANIA ANDRABI

“Seniors”-a term evoking mixed feelings: people ahead of you, your elders, demanding your respect, seeking your attention; but more than that, people who have been there before you, whose advice, love, and wise counsel helps and guides you, and when they leave the place, they leave with some memories unforgettable.

Seniors- ‘people to whom the juniors’ are seen hawking to for the previous years notes, or asking about the pattern of questioning of a particular teacher, or topics of importance and topics to overlook, or how to flatter a teacher, or what books to consult – they are the junior’s second teachers to everything.

Seeking admission in the University of Kashmir is a dream nourished by every student of our state, and so was it for me. It seems like yesterday – coming to this University and being ragged by the seniors’. Ragging as an interactive session between the seniors’ and the juniors’ wherein they get to know each other, blurring the line that separates them, is encouraging for the juniors’. However ragging also has an ugly side. There have been instances where the juniors’ have been maltreated by their seniors’ inasmuch that they stopped attending their classes and in the most extreme cases, committed suicide. Such incidents, instead of generating a comfort level between the two parties, initiate a fear psychosis in the juniors’. What needs to be understood is that the attitude of seniors’ in shaping the juniors’ is profound. They, on one hand can give direction, awareness, information, and knowledge to their juniors’, but on the other hand, can misguide them as well.

Bisma, a post-graduate student of English department on being asked if she was ragged by her seniors said, ‘‘I was so nervous that I could not utter a single word except for my name, but this did not irritate my seniors’, and instead they let me go. My seniors’ are really very helpful, and I in was helpful to my juniors’.”

Help and a few words of encouragement is what the junior’s need, but they don’t always get it. Here I can mention the experience opposite to it. A student from another department narrated his harrowing experience with his senior’s while being ragged by them. ‘‘After receiving a slap from one of my seniors’ on the very first day I joined my department I didn’t attend my classes for almost 15 days, and even now, when many months have gone by since that incident occurred, I feel the same trepidation on seeing that guy as I felt on that day.” Another student Muzaffer puts in, ‘‘I was made to do things that I was not comfortable doing, but had to do, for fear of the seniors’.”

Incidents such as these instead of bridging the gap between the seniors’ and juniors’ increase the rift between them. But there have been instances of good friends being made after an exchange of violence. Says Ishfaq, ‘‘When I refused to do what my seniors’ were asking me to do, I received two tight slaps from one of my seniors’. But now that guy has become my friend and he is the only one among my seniors who helps me whenever I need some guidance. Maybe the juniors’ should understand that it is their duty to respect the seniors.”

Respecting the seniors’ is what the juniors’ really need to understand and accept. After all it is the seniors’ whose guidance is something the juniors’ can’t do without. They teach the juniors’ how to bear the increasing pressures of the teachers’, a pressure that burns chunks of coals into diamonds. They inspire their junior’s by their aims and aspirations. After all it is with the seniors’ that the juniors’ have fun, share joys and sorrows – perhaps the most memorable days of their lives…..

Let juniors and seniors experience the joy of studying together. No need to be antagonistic. Joining hands will ensure a harmonious relation which lasts for good. Even if you are not physically together but you are bonded by some moments you love to remember. So why hate, why rag why not be friends.

(Syed Tania Andrabi is Second Semester student of Media Education Research Centre(MERC), University of Kashmir. She can be mailed at tania.andrabi@gmail.com)