New Rajasthan guidelines aim to curb suicides in Kota

Every year, tens of thousands of young people pour into Kota, for its famed institutes preparing students for medical and engineering entrance examinations.

Jaipur A mandatory screening test, the alphabetical sorting of students into sections instead of a ranking-based one, and the admission of students who are in Class IX or higher are some of the guidelines notified on Thursday by the Rajasthan government to prevent deaths by suicide in Kota’s coaching centres. There have been 25 such deaths in Kota thus far this year.

The guidelines are based on the recommendations of a 15-member committee.(AP)

The guidelines also mandate the creation of monitoring centres in Kota and Sikar, major coaching centres in the state, and a portal to house “all relevant data studying in coaching institutes”. And they prescribe legal action against faculty of coaching institutes if they violate any of the regulations. Though no details of the legal actions were mentioned in the guidelines, the committee said, “Such violation that may severely affect the students’ mental health will be considered as a criminal act and the district administration will take necessary legal action against it.”

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HT has seen a copy of the guidelines that have been notified.

The guidelines are based on the recommendations of a 15-member committee headed by education secretary Bhawani Singh Detha that was set up following a spate of deaths by suicide in Kota. An analysis by HT in late August found that more than half the deaths by suicide were of minors, and that many were from families that are either poor or part of the lower middle-class. HT first reported on some of the recommendations of the committee on September 16.

Every year, tens of thousands of young people from India’s hinterland pour into the Rajasthan town, whose famed institutes preparing students for medical and engineering entrance examinations constitute a ₹10,000 crore industry. These residential institutes represent a real shot at material prosperity and economic mobility for poor families but this also translates into inhuman pressure and stress on teenagers struggling to stay afloat in an intensely competitive environment away from home.

The guidelines seek to address several of the factors contributing to a surge in student deaths by suicide. For instance, a mandatory preadmission screening test is aimed at ensuring that only students above a certain proficiency level are admitted, preventing heartburn or worse caused by indiscriminate admission. And the Class IX floor is aimed at ensuring that students aren’t pushed into the grind of preparing for competitive exams when they are in Class VI or VII.

The guidelines also provide for “easy exit and refund policy” after the committee discovered that there was extreme pressure on students who realised they couldn’t compete, but also couldn’t go back home because their families had spent considerable sums, usually paid upfront, in funding their education.

They also directed the coaching institutes to “decide the batches alphabetically instead of the students’ ranks and not to shuffle and segregate them in the middle of the course based on the performances of the students in the weekly assessments”. This was common practice across institutes, as was the practice of publicising the scores of students in these assessments, which has now been barred.

The guidelines also ask the institutes to not glorify toppers. In 2022, the Rajasthan government drafted a bill that prohibited private institutes from glorifying the success of toppers, prescribed an aptitude test for admission, and made registration mandatory, but the legislation was never tabled.

The new guidelines also recommend mandatory training for teachers, institute managers, other staff, and the wardens of the hostels and paying guest accommodations to enable them assess behavioural changes of students and take further preventive measures.

“A trilateral memorandum of understanding (MoU) will be signed with the National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences (NIMHANS), the state government, and the people who daily communicate with the students such as coaching institutes, and the hostel management for such training,” the guidelines add. They also direct institutes to appoint a sufficient number of professional psychiatrists and counsellors .

“The students will also have to be counselled by them regularly. First counselling should be done within 45 days of the admission followed by the second one after 90 days and the third one in 120 days,” the guidelines say, adding that any student found “vulnerable” on the basis of these should immediately be provided with “optional career counselling.”

Later on Thursday, Rajasthan chief secretary Usha Sharma, in a meeting with the coaching authorities and the district collectors, said that a meeting will be held with all the stakeholders, the district administration, and the district police in every 10 days to regularly monitor the proper execution of the guidelines in coaching centres, hotels, and paying guest (PG) accommodations.

“It is the responsibility of the coaching operators to prevent any such untoward incidents among students. The state government is making serious efforts to keep a check on the matter. A meeting will be held in this regard in every 10 days,” said Sharma, adding that the district collector and district police superintendents will ensure compliance with the guidelines in the coaching institutes of the district.

Commenting on the guidelines, M S Chauhan, Director of Vibrant Academy, Kota, said, “The instructions laid out in the guidelines are welcome. Setting a code of conduct for the staff and faculties and also putting legal action in case of violation of those conducts might enable them to work more sensibly. We will also try to follow not to reshuffle the batches anymore as per the guidelines though it only used to take place based on the performance.”

Jaipur-based sociologist Rajeev Gupta said, “All such actions by the administration are an eye-wash. The root cause of the students’ suicide in the coaching institute is the imposition of a cultural isolation on these students by the coaching centres. The students who arrive in Kota leaving their entire domestic world are not even provided with any psycho-emotional support. The administration fail to understand it. The syllabus of these examinations are also beyond the standard of a class-12 student which is a fact that has never been taken care of by the government.”