New Delhi: A 2012 Lancet report claimed that India has one of the world’s highest suicide rates for youth aged 15 to 29. This means that every hour, one student commits suicide in the country. This may be hard to digest but with the cut-throat competition and high aspirations of peers and family, the pressure on students keeps mounting. Even college life is not filled with fun and frolic.
The rising pressure often makes students prone to depression. Over the years, “depression” has become a primary reason for students to take the extreme step of ending their lives. It is during this phase that the support mechanisms in educational institutions play a crucial role in reaching out to students. With lakhs of students studying in the Delhi University, it makes sure to deal with the puzzling issues the students may face.
Initially, the DU ‘Mind Body Centre’ (MBC) located at North Campus offered face-to-face counselling to girl students and faculty. The varsity also launched a helpline number in the year 2015 to offer free counselling. The varsity even provides an email-based counselling where students can write about their problems and the responses are delivered within 48 hours.
Unlike DU, Jamia Millia Islamia’s “counselling and guidance centre” conducts weekly/fortnightly workshops, lectures, meetings, and orientation programs to assist students in overcoming current and specific problems. With the increasing suicide cases at the IITs in the last few years, even IIT-Delhi has decided to revamp its curriculum, which would focus less on theory and more on practical experience.
