Suicide Effect: Delhi University Colleges Come To Students’ Rescue; Know How

New Delhi: Delhi University is leaving no stone unturned to help students cope with the pandemic. Having one-on-one interactions to assess students’ mental wellness, providing fee support, internet data cards and laptops to those in needs are in the DU-affiliated colleges’ plans to help students during this tough time.

Lady Sri Ram College Principal Suman Sharma said the college administration has announced a reduction in fee for a few courses, setting up a panel to provide laptops and allowed some second-year students to reside in hostels.

“Given the fact that students are not able to avail certain facilities of the college due to being off-campus, the college has removed such charges from the fees this year. This has led to a substantial reduction in the fee. In addition, it is possible to pay the fee in instalments,” the principal was quoted as saying by news agency PTI.

“Keeping in mind the exceptional circumstances of the COVID-19 pandemic, current second year students upon fresh application and on the basis of need will be allowed to stay in the hostel after the commitments to incoming first years and the current third years, who already are in the hostel, have been met,” Sharma added.

Bijaylaxmi Nanda, the principal of Miranda House, said the college is working on providing internet data packs to students on whom the burden has increased due to classes switching to the online platform during the pandemic.

“We realised it during the first month of lockdown only that just online classes will not be enough and equal attention will have to be paid to mental wellness. We took some steps but we will increase our efforts now and focus on one-on-one interactions,” Nanda was quoted by PTI.

“We are exploring options for offering financial support to students not just in terms of fee waiver but to provide internet data cards as well to help in online classes,” she further said.

The St Stephen’s college staff association has also approached the college principal, demanding setting up of a panel to reach out to students facing monetary issues. “As we are all aware, the pandemic has caused great distress in the society. There is an increased financial hardship and some of our students are facing genuine difficulties in accessing online classes and paying the fees,” staff association president Nandita Narain was quoted by the agency.

It may be recalled that Lady Shri Ram College for Women student Aishwarya, an IAS aspirant, was found hanging at her Shadnagar house in Telangana’s Ranga Reddy district on November 2. The suicide note, purportedly written by her, read that the 19-year-old took the extreme step as she did not want to burden her parents with her educational expenses, cops said.