New Delhi, May 16
Cracking a whip on students indulging in ragging, the Supreme Court today ordered the educational institutions to file FIRs against them and said the punishment had to be “exemplary and justifiably” harsh to act as a deterrence against the recurrence of the abhorrent practice.
With the new admission season round the corner, the court also warned that any failure, negligence or deliberate delay on the part of the institutional authority to file an FIR with the local police, after the institutional mechanism failed to sort out the problem would be made culpable. A Bench of Justices Arijit Pasayat and S.H. Kapadia was giving a slew of directions, while accepting most of the recommendations of the Raghavan committee, which gave a voluminous report on ways to end the pernicious practice of ragging.
The court also put the onus on the educational institutions to file a criminal case against the perpetrators of ragging if the victim or the parents failed to do so.
“Needless to add that every victim or his parent/guardian of ragging can also file an FIR directly with the police, but failure on the part of the victim to do so should not justify the delay, or neglect or failure on the part of the institutional authorities,” it said.
However, the apex court said it would consider at a later stage the plea for banning corporal punishment in primary and secondary educational institutions, which according to the committee was a contributory factor for students to develop bullying tendencies and indulge in ragging.
— PTI
