Why grievance cells are still a lesser known part of campuses

The recent allegations against an assistant professor in an Aruppukottai-based college of luring girl students to provide sexual favours to top officials has put the spotlight on harassment in college campuses in the state and the stringency it should be dealt with.

In the light of the allegations, the Tamil Nadu government formed a committee last month to draft guidelines to curb

sexual harassment

in the future.

However, the ground reality of campuses is quite different with awareness levels about grievance cells being very poor among students. While most

colleges

in Chennai have a grievance redressal cell on campus, students that TOI contacted across campuses said they were either not sure or unaware of such a mechanism on their campus.

Several students of

SRM Institute of Science and Technology

were unsure when questioned about the existence of a sexual harassment cell on campus. An exception was a final year student who acknowledged that the college had a sexual harassment cell with a helpline number but said it has not been active and was hardly approached by students. "In such situations we usually approach the class in-charge, but many students refrain from filing a complaint, fearing backlash," the student said.

While most campuses have a grievance cell, there is no separate wing to address sexual harassment.

Loyola College

representative

Anthony Samy

said all complaints are received by

grievance cell

and dealt with individually.

However, not all students are clear about the procedure to file a complaint.Sharing an incident where she had filed a complaint against a staff member, a final year student of Loyola College said that the college has been supportive and conducts occasional meetings with the director to openly share problems. "But, I am not sure whom we are expected to approach regarding sexual harassment," she said.

Sai Ram College despite its strict rules doesn’t have a sexual harassment cell. "There is no such cell in the college, and I doubt that anyone has ever had any problem to file a complaint," said a student from the college.

A student from a college in Thanjavur said when students muster the confidence to approach the administration in a sexual harassment case, a mechanism should be in place to make them comfortable while registering their complaint.

Educationists admitted that awareness levels need to be increased regarding such mechanisms and that complaints have to be dealt with severe punishment to create an impact. "People should remember how these incidents of sexual harassment were dealt with so that others don’t dare to repeat them," said educationist Jayaprakash Gandhi.

Higher education secretary Sunil Paliwal said that many guidelines have already been communicated to colleges, but are forgotten with the passage of time due to poor implementation. "The existing mechanism needs to be oiled, updated and reinforced into the system lest it is forgotten. This is why the TN government has formed the committee," he said.

The committee comprising Madras University VC Prof Duraisamy and Tamil Nadu Open University VC M Bhaskaran has submitted the first draft of the guidelines to the government and will be submitting a revised draft soon.

Duraisamy said the committee is looking into various kinds of harassment. "Since the UGC guidelines on sexual harassment are very comprehensive, we are trying to strictly reinforce its implementation on campuses. The guidelines formulated now will look into harassment between colleagues, student-teacher equations or superiors and subordinates where power can be misused," he said.

Besides advising colleges on ways to deal with complaints related to any kind of harassment, the guidelines will also look at different kinds of harassment including delay with thesis work, conducting viva or interviews.

(With inputs from Gayatri Vasudevan)