To Ease Students’ Stress, IIT Delhi Drops One Set Of Mid-Semester Exams: Director Rangan Banerjee

The dropping of exams come following various cases of suicides in IITs, fuelling up debates on mental health condition and academic pressure of IIT students.

Revising its evaluation system, the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi, has dropped a set of mid-semester exams. The move from the institution comes as a bid to reduce stress levels among students, as per Director Rangan Bannerjee. The revised evaluation system comes following the surfacing of multiple incidents of suicides across various IITs in the country, stirring up debates on the hectic and rigorous curriculum and study schedule in IITs, impacting the overall mental health of students. 

"Earlier we used to have two sets of exams during a semester, final exams at the end of each semester and several continuous evaluation mechanisms. We conducted an internal survey and based on feedback from all students and faculty, we have decided to drop one set of exams. So, now there will be two sets of exams besides routine evaluations," IIT Delhi Director Rangan Bannerjee was reported as saying by PTI. 

"We felt that the exam calendar was too packed and hence decided to reduce student burden and stress. The decision has also been approved by the Senate and will be implemented from the ongoing semester. A maximum cap of 80 per cent weightage has been kept for the two examinations," he was further reported as saying. 

Notably, the IIT Council in its meeting in April this year, underlined the need to increase psychological counselling and enhanced grievance redressal system in IITs to curb stress and the fear of failure and rejection among students. The meeting took a deeper cognizance of the mental health of IIT students, suicides, and alleged discrimination of students at IIT campuses. 

However, despite the concerns and pointers drawn out in the IIT Council meeting, Union Minister of State for Education Subhas Sarkar informed the Rajya Sabha last month that twenty cases of student suicides have already been reported in higher education institutions (HEIs) in 2023 so far. These include nine cases from central universities and seven from IITs.

The minister noted that according to the National Crime Records Bureau, there are various causes of suicides such as professional problems, sense of isolation, violence, family problems and mental disorders, among others.

(With inputs from PTI)

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