University as Prison: A Parent Writes
Kirti Trivedi | 22 January 2025 | The Edict
For me, the most distressing and disturbing sight for the last two days have been the images forwarded to me, in which the hand-baggage and the vehicles of students arriving in Ashoka University for the next semester are being thoroughly searched, including glove compartments. Scanners and metal detectors have been installed at Ashoka as enhanced security measures. But to prevent what? What is it that Ashoka University does not want its students to bring in the campus? I am trying to think, but cannot think of anything young students cannot bring in as part of what they would like to have with them. Surely the management does not think that the mother of the student would have lovingly packed a pot of marijuana for the boy to consume; which the security person will confiscate during their frisking and help keep the campus pure and uncontaminated? Good educational institutes normally plan a welcome for the returning students. I, myself, have planned such sessions giving incoming students floral bouquets and welcome notes with a smile, so that both students and their accompanying parents feel good. Why does Ashoka think that it has to treat its students as criminals who will necessarily come to campus for disciplinary subversion and that their baggage must be checked to keep the university crime-free?…