Special cells keep students in check

State home minister RR Patil announced a novel plan in September 2005 to prevent incidents of ragging of junior students by senior students.

He formed special cells of officials attached to the state intelligence department who were directed to hang around campuses in civil clothing and cultivate a network of informers from the students’ community that could tip them off about students who indulged in the act of ragging their juniors. Weekly reports were to be submitted by these cells on ragging incidents, with a special emphasis around colleges that housed residential quarters for the student community.

According to The Maharashtra Prohibition of Ragging Act, 1999, a person who is convicted of ragging may be imprisoned for up to two years’ in addition to being fined Rs10,000. The Act was passed to protect victims of bullying after a Sophia College student, Indu Anto, died after falling from the seventh floor of a college hostel on August 4, 1998. Anto had been the victim of ragging by a senior student.