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Odd that such things should happen in India. Those incidents that are reported and those that are not. India has 9000 higher institutions of learning I believe, involving millions of new entrants. It is the duty of the institution to make sure that such incidents and the peculiar Indian culture of ragging does not take place.
In the UK, where I attended three higher institutions of learning, events such as "Freshers Fair" "Freshers Ball" "Fresher week" were organized which were events organized specifically by the university/Student Union to make the new student feel welcomed and at home........so....music, music, dancing, music, beer, music, beer, music, and finally some cheap beer. Girls and boys mixing, and mixing, and dancing, and drinking, and dancing. Indeed the first year in many UK universities could be described as one long Party.
They do have a "Rag week" but the meaning is totally different from the Indian sense. (i) Its not open ended, its only for a week. Its starts at a specific date, and finishes at a specific date within a week. (ii) Rag week is a holistic activity based week where many things happen which cater to both boys and girls tastes and sensibilities. It is authorized, and organized by the university and very transparent.
During one rag week I joined the "Flour & eggs gang" showering unsuspecting students with these things during lectures or outside, but not before we had done our homework and made sure the student would take it in good humor being publicly humiliated. It wasn't physical in the sense of ever touching any of our victims. And then the Rag week would finish.
The Indian ragging has shades of obvious Sado-Masochistic pseudo homosexual repressed delayed action about it---MALE ON MALE presumably, with humiliation and torture being KEYSTONES of the "Ceremony". India strikes me as a shaggless sex starved nation, with latent prudish petty Victorian values. Morals and values are good, but not for mere show in the wrong fucking area, used as an instrument of control. The police will arrest you if you kiss in public. The universities and institutions of higher learning in India need to do what they do in the UK, and allow greater male female interaction, with parties, and come down heavily, with expulsions on ragging.
Education should not merely be an opportunity for "enlightenment" and the avenue of greater career opportunities, but should be thoroughly fun.
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