[HT] Hindu reports ragging to police

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Anuradha Mukherjee

This may be the first case of ragging in the Capital to be reported to the police after the Supreme Court declared it a cognisable offence. The principal of Hindu College has filed a police complaint against a student set to graduate this year for ragging a first-year BSC Applied Physical Science student. The victim has alleged, in his complaint, that he was forced to dance and the perpetrators abused him when he refused.

"We have lodged a police complaint against a student from Haryana who finished his course this year. We have also banned his entry into the college. We have also summoned the father of another student from Srinagar in Jammu and Kashmir," said Hindu College Principal Kavita Sharma.

"We did not lodge a first information report (FIR) as we had not received a complaint. The victim submitted the written complaint in the evening. We may lodge an FIR on Wednesday."

The college authorities will meet on Wednesday morning to discuss the issue and meet the parents of the errant students. A third student has also been named in the complaint. According to Sharma, some faculty members who were taking a round of the canteen in the morning found a group of boys ragging a first-year student.

"They immediately intervened. When I asked the perpetrators which year they were in, one of them said he had finished his BA Programme course from the college and had come to collect his result. He also said that he was only interacting with the student. Results for the course are not out yet and he had no business to be in college. The word interaction cannot be allowed to be turned into a euphemism for ragging," said Sharma.

The college has also issued a letter to the second guilty student and has asked him to call his parents, failing which an FIR would be registered against him.