[Telegraph] IIT students to get ‘referee’

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Lucknow, June 25: An ombudsman will help solve students’ problems at IIT Kanpur, rocked by a spate of suicides and incidents of ragging over the past three years.

A search is on to find somebody suitable for the job, but the institute’s deputy director, Kripa Shankar, said a retired high court judge would be preferred. “The students may have complaints against anyone or anything. They may have something against me. They can approach the ombudsman.”

The ombudsman — the campus equivalent of a referee — should start work from July. An independent authority, he will help students raise problems with their department heads and even the director, if need be.

At present, a dean of students’ affairs handles the job, but he finds it difficult to cope with the issues of an institute which now has over 3,000 students, IIT sources said.

Also, the dean usually deals with academic matters, while the problems of students are often about relations with a teacher and troubles with peers or seniors.

Authorities hope that having an ombudsman in place will help avert incidents like the one where a student upset at his unsolved problems tried to smash his head on a glass-pane outside the director’s office two years back.

Some steps have been taken on against ragging, a scourge the institute has been trying to get rid of for some time. Students were asked to sign an undertaking declaring they would not indulge in such practices.

On suicides, the authorities were surprised that the incidents occurred because students opt for counselling and those prone to taking the dire step are kept under watch.