Supreme Court forms task force to check suicides of students on campuses

The Supreme Court, in response to the rising number of suicides in educational institutions, established a task committee on Monday to improve the system for protecting students on campuses.

A bench of justices JB Pardiwala and R Mahadevan mentioned deaths that occurred in college residence halls during the past two months as a result of caste discrimination, ragging, sexual harassment, and other causes, and they stated that these were not isolated cases. We believe that we must talk about the trend of student suicides. We are considerably more troubled by the fact that... [these] are not isolated events.

The task force led by retired Supreme Court judge S Ravindra Bhat was established by the court, and it has four months to provide a report outlining the reasons behind student suicides and suggesting ways to improve the systems in place to prevent them. The secretaries of the departments of higher education, social justice, women and child development, and legal affairs would also be on the committee, it stated.