Parental and academic pressures, anxiety under lens in BITS probe

MARGAO
The high level committee headed by South Goa district Collector, Egna Cletus, IAS constituted by the government to conduct an inquiry into the recent death of BITS Pilani student is probing into various aspects, including issues such as parental pressures, academic pressures, anxiety issues which have contributed to the factors leading to the death of the five students.

In fact, the probe panel has started the exercise of interaction with the parents of the five deceased students to find out their observations with regard to the incidents. Interactions with the students are also underway.

The district Collector told the media on Friday that the district level committee has set in motion the inquiry based on the guidelines issued by the Supreme Court in July last. “The district level committee has conducted preliminary meetings based on which we have framed a check list how to go about the probe,” the Collector said.

Saying that she along with the Committee members has visited the BITS Pilani campus around two weeks ago, the Collector said the panel has interacted with BITS Pilani academic team, including the Dean, besides representatives of students and the Institute’s Mental Health team under the name of Empower, besides the counsellors.

“We have posed them certain questions based on the Supreme Court’s guidelines. After the meeting, we have started the exercise to find out the reasons behind the death of the five students. We are currently interacting with the parents to find out their observations with the incidents,” she said.

She added: “Primarily we have been told that the students were saying there was parental pressure on them. We have observed in the case of the three students that they had anxiety issues. We want to know whether these anxiety issues were pertaining to academic pressure or anything else. We are currently interacting with the parents and students.”

Saying that sub-committees have been constituted and divided into multiple teams, the district Collector said these teams are frequently visiting the BITS Pilani campus and interacting and questioning the counsellors. “These teams have been trying to find out the facilities that have been provided to the students from the perspective of mental health,” she said.

Saying that the interaction with the parents is almost over, the Collector said, “Once the parents give their reply, we will send a questionnaire before compiling a report which will be submitted to the government.”