– Mita Mukherjee

IIT Kharagpur will include parents in the induction programme for the new first-year B.Tech batch scheduled to be held on July 25, Suman Chakraborty, the institute director said.

The institute took the decision amid rising incidents of student deaths on campus with an aim to motivate parents to not exert pressure on their wards to secure good internship and placement as “parental pressure” has been found to be the reason for mental stress among students.

An expert committee set up by the institute to look into the spate of suicides on campus has identified “parental pressure” as one of primary causes of mental stress of children and suggested the institute to take necessary measures to ensure that young students are not subjected to such pressure, the director said.

In the past seven months, four students have been found dead by hanging in their hostel rooms on the institute campus.

In the most recent incident, Ritam Mondal, a fourth-year student of mechanical engineering was found hanging in his room at the Rajendra Prasad Hall on July 18. It was the fifth incident since June 2024.

“We are facing a very big problem. We will have to prevent students from taking this drastic step. We will start including parents in the students induction programme from this year itself to reduce parental pressure,” Chakraborty told EducationWorld.

During their interaction with members of the expert committee on Monday, almost 100 percent students have have said that they are subjected to parental pressure, the director said. The panel began interacting with students from Monday.

The expert panel met the institute officials on Tuesday when they suggested that parents should be included in the induction programme.

“We have accepted the suggestion immediately,” the director said.

During the induction programmes, the institute will not only urge parents to not put pressure on students to obtain high grades in order to secure best jobs and internships, but they will be also made aware about the IIT system and how students are required to work hard while studying the course. 

The expert committee comprising psychiatrists, psychologists, counsellors, alumni, legal experts and educationists was set up in May this year to find out the causes leading to suicides and suggest measures to the institute to curb student death on campus. The committee was set up after the family of Aniket Walker, a fourth-year students was found dead on April 20.

Also read: Fourth-year B Tech student found hanging in hostel room at IIT Kharagpur