Ramblings: A Heartless University in the Midst of a Raging Pandemic
The world has turned upside down. Fear and grief have enveloped the universe. All norms of normalcy and order in life have been toppled completely by a microscopic organism wreaking havoc throughout the globe. It’s a whirlwind of emotions, a cauldron of suffering. I believe Charles Dickens’ opening lines from A Tale of Two Cities somewhat manage to capture and depict the entire array of feelings going about:
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair.
It’s a time when people are dropping dead from a lack of oxygen. People have literally live-tweeted their journey to death. Social media platforms have transformed into distress helplines. There is no dignity in death either with all of the anguish those left behind are having to face in performing last rites of those who are no longer with us. It’s troubling to think of all the lives that could have been saved… all those people who could still have been here. Every other person you know is reeling from the infection. Those of us spared by the virus are simply languishing in life.
In the midst of all this wickedness, there is University. While online education was touted throughout the whole of 2020 as a game-changer for the education “industry”, the students’ verdict has been the polar opposite. You would say that students always want to hatch an escape-plan from attending classes and writing exams, why then should their verdict matter in the first place? It’s plain simple. We don’t speak and act for profit, that’s what those heading the unicorn education start-ups do. I am a student at National Law University, Nagpur — one of the supposedly premier law schools in India. Fun fact: the new academic building of this University was recently inaugurated without the presence of those essential stakeholders for whose use it has been built — the students. Strange enough.
While the pandemic rages on, my University has decided to impose examinations upon its students. In spite of calls for leniency from students, they have even deviated from the previously agreed-upon Contingency Examination Policy to add a significant burden on us as we will now be answering several more questions in the same time period as before. The fact that the “Contingency” exam policy has been departed from shows that the University is of the belief everything is back to normal. This reeks of authoritarianism and high-handedness, something which has become characteristic of all institutions in India over the past decade. Numerous students are suffering from COVID-19 amidst this second wave, whereas lives of several others are at a standstill from attending to sick parents and losing loved ones during the past one year. Even if someone has managed to avoid all of this turmoil, the strain and distress created by living under lockdowns and curfews has definitely left them perturbed.
At such a critical point in time, one that no one has been prepared for, forcing students to appear for exams without any leniency begs the question of where humanity is headed. There is no denying that even the faculty and staff members of the University are suffering from the effects of this pandemic. Everyone will acknowledge that they have been personally affected, mentally and physically. Yet, in their roles as decision-makers of the University, the faculty and staff seem to forget their own suffering and fail to take into account that the situation is not a normal one. Why must we make it appear as if it is normal by holding continuous classes and conducting examinations?
What’s even more ironic is that when our student representatives dart-off emails asking for initiation of the scholarships process, something that ought to have been done wayyyy back in October, the authorities reply that the difficulties created by the onset of the pandemic have rendered it impossible for the administration to perform such a task. I fail to understand how it is expected of students to study and appear for exams stretching over seven days when the University administration has been unable to function adequately for the past seven months. It’s crazy, isn’t it!?!
The matter highlighted in this post could be branded as a “first-world” problem in terms of the negligible consequences that an exam would carry. I wouldn’t dare to disagree with such a branding. The world is bearing witness to unparalleled destruction and an exam would mean nothing to those who have lost their loved ones and are in a constant struggle for survival. The only point I wish to put out is that at a time when mental health is being increasingly recognised as an integral component of a person’s well-being, it is worrying that our educational institutes are becoming harbingers of unmatched stress and anxiety. The apathy shown by my University towards its students’ welfare is disconcerting to say the least. I find myself to be fairly disappointed that while the University had created lots of fanfare at the appointment of our Mental Health Counselor (who is doing great work!), they do not in fact give any importance to mental health. In a period of time when everybody needs mutual support and co-operation just to make things work, the University has turned its back upon us.
They should have ideally been just one call away…
