IIT alumni from SC-ST communities to help students with placements, mental health

NEW DELHI: A group of alumni of the Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT) who belong to the historically-marginalised Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes have launched a Global Alumni Support System or Mentoring Club for SC-ST students currently enrolled across IITs. The decision came after a group of alumni visited IIT Delhi following the suicides of Anil Verma and Ayush Ashna, two Dalit BTech students, in less than two months of each other.

The group had visited to offer solutions to the institute in terms of mentoring and discuss grievance redress systems. “We saw a need to provide support to the students facing problems in the IIT campuses,” said Dheeraj Singh, an IIT Kanpur alumnus, who is driving the initiative.

The group will provide support and mentoring to SC-ST students across IITs, helping them with resume building, personalised mock-interviews with industry experts, job search, salary negotiation, access to alumni network and emotional support. “The first batch of the programme started with more than 100 students studying at seven IITs. Through the programme, we help them in placements and mental health,” added Singh.

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Support before IIT placements 2023

At present, 50 mentors have joined the initiative and another 500 alumni are part of their network. “The programme is a hook that we are supporting students with on their career path,” explained Singh. The IIT alumni community is very concerned and doesn’t want to lose any more students. “We want to uncover any students who are facing issues,” he said.

Started a few days back, the first batch includes students from IIT Madras, IIT Kanpur, IIT Delhi and IIT Bombay. 50 of them are now building on their CVs. “In total, we have kept five to six levels where we plan to mentor students for close to two months before they get prepared for the placement month in December. Through these levels of mentorship, we want to make the students more confident and self-assured of converting an interview into a job offer,” added Singh.

That apart, the group also aims to uncover and address mental health problems. “We have a questionnaire to understand their overall mental well-being as many students are not comfortable speaking about it,” said Singh.

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Mental health support

“We do not want to have any more Darshan or Anil or Ayush,” said Singh. Another undergraduate student died by suicide on October 8. “Looking at the trend, the suicides are not going to stop here because there is a lack of infrastructure to cater to the students and increasing stress in IITs,” he said. “The system of the IITs expects students who are not well to seek help but they are not in a position to ask for help.”

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Verma was found days after he took his own life in the hostel. “The system is so unaware that students are lost in the sea of the campus,” he added. Anil’s problem started when his father died in Covid when he was in the third semester of his BTech. “Despite being in the system, no one could reach out to him and offer help to at least live a normal life,” said Singh. “They just don’t care. It's the same in every IIT. Institutes claim many counsellors and systems but if the student is struggling, how can they reach out to the counsellor,” stated Singh.

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