The day I came to Indian Institute of Technology, Madras for the first time – 15th of September 2022, on the verge of beginning my next academic endeavour for the following half decade, excited to belong to a college renowned for its exclusivity, meritocratic nature and competitive spirit, thrilled about the life I was on the precipice of commencing, someone else in this very institution, who had belonged here for several years, made the decision to take their own life. A student, who, a few years ago, must have had the same feelings of excitement and enthralment that I had that day.
The potential similarities of thought between me and that person on our respective first days and the contrast between them on that specific Thursday is uncanny to think of. On Friday, newspaper articles and scores of condolence messages on my recently acquired smail account would inform me regarding this tragedy and would be my introduction to the epidemic of student suicides in my beloved campus, dare I say, my next home.
Thomas Joiner, an American psychologist who has researched extensively on the subject, explained the concept of, and an individual’s engagement towards suicide through his thesis called the “Interpersonal theory of suicide”. It demonstrates how suicidal desires are mainly driven from two specific factors – “perceived burdensomeness” which refers to an individual’s belief that their existence is a burden to others, and “thwarted belongingness” which refers to the feeling of social isolation or alienation.
Joiner further states that these influences lead to the “acquired capability” of suicide for he does not believe human beings to be innately capable of suicide. It is extremely painful to think that someone with whom we share living space, someone who we meet daily, someone who eats food from the same mess, goes to the same library, takes the same classes, and lives a life so like ourselves can be so extensively influenced from such factors that it has led to their decision of death over life. But the first step to solving a problem is acknowledging its existence and thus we must delve deeper into the psychology behind the suicides of students and present our own perspectives in regard to it.
To begin with, students are, in their heart, homeless people. We have houses to live in, and hostels to stay the nights at, but we do not have a hearth to come back to. Countless among us have never felt the sense of togetherness, of love in our hostel experiences as we were advertised by people who have experienced similar circumstances as us. Our sense of belonging to some place, somewhere where we can go to take our burdens off our shoulders, to have someone love us unconditionally, irrespective of our merits or demerits, our talents or our flaws, and a place to be who are truly are behind the disguise we present to our contemporaries and compatriots alike, is stolen from us when we go miles away from our homes inside the blessed building and venerated venues of Indian Institute of Technology, Madras. We are burdened with the legacy of the ghosts of our past alumni who have achieved wonders we might never be able to live up to, while being devoid of any form of support system or safe space to breathe into. This leads to the emergence of the problem of alienation.
With alienation comes sadness, hopelessness, and later, dejection, but not a single individual to share this with. While every case is individually characterised, the generalisation of students and their tribulations by institutes all around has led to the belief among many of our contemporaries that we cannot share – for the person we want to share our problems with is, at the end of the day, a competitor, another person who will apply for the same positions, jobs, same companies, and to let oneself be vulnerable to them is an unprotected Achilles’ heel. If one does pass this complication, and wants to entrust one’s contemporary with their vulnerabilities, one still does not approach them for the fear of “perceived burdensomeness”.
Every individual’s mental constitution is different, but in a university, we live similar lives. I wake up at the same time as my roommate does. I have breakfast with him, it is I who helps him with his philosophy course, while he furnishes me with his economics notes. We have similar routines, similar habits, similar interests, similar desires and as such, we have similar troubles as well. So, how am I supposed to go to him, and tell him that while he is doing fine, I am not? He is more capable, I am not. How and why should I be able to burden him with my problems, when I see him handling the same problems without any form of dysthymia? This delusion of burden along with the increasing sense of alienation and a stubborn necessity to strengthen ourselves for we have been told that the real world is more difficult, leads to a recession of our mental health, and becomes a furtherance towards the decision that death is easier than life itself. To conclude, we then acquire the ability to end our existence.
In the recent past, I have heard about a plethora of deaths through suicides in our campus; the condolence messages which terrified me on my first day in college have now become a regular occurrence in my life. Along with this, an institution severely tainted with an increasingly regressive culture, where students must face tribalistic forms of authority, such as vigilance services, and an administration so ineffective and condescending in nature, act as a catalyst to the detriment of students’ mental health. After every death, the receiving of a template condolence message, and overtly propagative method to demonstration their faux concern for us, have all acted to severely harm the culture of suicide in my campus.
The defence mechanisms of the students are versatile – from night-long persistent protests to making jokes about the tragedy itself. We laugh about the tragedy, we cry, sometimes. The opinion regarding the bravery or cowardice behind such a step is highly debatable, yet no one debates. Silent toasts are taken in the name of the people no more with us, and no progress is achieved. What is achieved is that with every death, we get more and more aware of the loneliness of our circumstances, and our denial is shattered.
In learning the ability to kill ourselves, we learn of how we are denied the ability to live.
Edited By Amirtha Varshini V C
Article 19 