(I wrote this article for myMO (the newspaper), so it might sound a little loud and rhetorical. But it’s pretty much what I feel about ragging, though I might have expressed it in a subtler manner)

Ragging is in the limelight again with cases capturing eyeballs nationwide. What happened to Aman drew flak from all quarters, especially the media. The Supreme Court too expressed its disgruntlement at the slack implementation of its directives by various colleges. The colleges were more or less in the denial mode; they maintained that the incidents were ‘isolated cases’ and outside the campus. ‘Isolated cases’ and ‘outside the campus’ became their getaway-phrases. In between this blame-game ragging itself is burgeoning like an underground movement. It’s not as plain-to-view as it was earlier but has adopted a more subtle approach. But the statistics about the ragging, related to death and suicides points to the fact that ragging is still a prominent member of an average Indian college campus, even though a reticent one nowadays.
So, why can’t our society get rid of this phantom that is ragging? In an answer to this question, Anurag Kashyap’s most recent flick, Gulaal, showed us how ragging is entrenched in our cultural ethos. But to its credit, Gulaal showed ragging’s ugly side, its violent character and a profession practiced by the ‘villains’ (as in the movie). In the process, Gulaal brought-down ragging’s glamour quotient. But sadly for us, Gulaal is a niche movie, seen and appreciated by only a handful. In contrast, something like ‘Five point someone’ trivializes ragging, some would even say, glamorizes it as an art to be practiced and refined. A pop-cultural entity, like ‘Five point someone’, trivializing ragging gives it mass social acceptance. In such cases, it not only nullifies the affect of movies like Gulaal but also easily overrides it and hence we still don’t have a powerful enough ‘anti-ragging’ pop-culture symbol.
Apart from weak anti-ragging pop-culture symbols, every college has its lobby of ragging-apologists. In defense, these guardians of ragging say that ‘ragging is good for the development of their juniors, it makes them stronger and socially more competent’. So in this case, not only is ragging deemed acceptable, it assumes proportions of morality, as if, ragging was almost philanthropic. The second reason is ‘interaction’; ‘How will seniors and juniors interact and develop an everlasting bond.’ But the problem is, these ‘bonds’ are not naturally developed, they are often forced upon the juniors and become a social burden or obligation. Aren’t there better ways to foster interaction? Generally, more acceptable ways to nurture these interactions can be clubs, which bring together students having similar interests under one roof. Drama clubs, sports clubs, writing clubs are a few examples. It gives seniors a perfect opportunity to mentor their juniors. Hence, the problem of a lack-of-interaction, in world devoid of ragging, is merely an illusion.
So what is the real face of ragging behind the masquerade of ‘interaction’ and ‘personality-development-philanthropy’? This is what happens: most students who were ragged in their first year of college, take it out on their incoming juniors; ‘Hamaree ragging hue hai toh hum bhi laygay.’ Vindictiveness. It becomes an absurd game of tit-for-tat. Ragging also becomes an outlet for sadistic creativity. Even when not physical, the consistent pressures of ragging take its toll upon any bright young person. I’m not suggesting that it produces a generation of ragging-retards, but it just an awful waste of intellect. There is nothing nice about ragging and definitely it’s not ‘cool’. It’s just a parasite that’s eating up our youth.