NEW DELHI, 24 Mar: The Supreme Court on Monday said that “relentless pressure” to perform in a purely score-based education system and the “extreme competition” for limited seats in premier educational institutions put a “terrifying burden” on students’ mental health.
A bench of Justices JB Pardiwala and R Mahadevan was cognisant of the rising incidents of student suicides on college campuses and in higher educational institutions when it said it is high time to formulate comprehensive guidelines to mitigate the underlying causes contributing to such students’ distress.
The bench constituted a National Task Force (NTF) to address the mental health concerns of students and prevent incidents of suicides, and said that the duty of colleges is not just to ensure academic excellence of the students but also their mental wellbeing.
“Universities must acknowledge their role not just as centres of learning but as institutions responsible for the wellbeing and holistic development of their students,” the bench said.
Former apex court judge Justice S Ravindra Bhat would be the chairperson of the NTF, which will also have Dr Alok Sarin, consultant psychiatrist of Sitaram Bhartia Institute of Science and Research, New Delhi, as one of its members.
The bench said that the NTF includes representatives from diverse fields to ensure an interdisciplinary approach to tackling the issue of commission of suicides in higher educational institutions.
The bench directed the Centre to deposit Rs 20 lakhs with the registry within two weeks as an outlay for the initial operations of the NTF.
The directions came on an appeal filed by the parents of two deceased students against a January 2024 order of the Delhi High Court, which refused to direct the police to register an FIR in connection with the suicide by the two students.
It directed Delhi Police to register an FIR on the complaints of the family members of two students who died by suicide while studying at the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi, in 2023. (PTI)