Nagaland Student Faces Horrific 'Communal' Ragging at NEHU Tura Campus

TURA: A horrifying case of ragging has surfaced at a hostel on the North-Eastern Hill University (NEHU) campus in Tura, Meghalaya, where a student from Nagaland was allegedly subjected to severe abuse by his seniors.

Reports suggest that this ragging incident had a communal dimension to it. The incident occurred on October 8, around 1:30 am, during the victim's first day on the NEHU campus. The victim, a student in the Department of Agri Business Management at NEHU, was staying at the Arabella Boys' Hostel when he was subjected to inhumane treatment and abuse by his seniors.

Senior students knocked on his dorm room and later took him to an empty room in the hostel. In a shocking turn of events, they used flashlights to obscure their faces and directed the victim to introduce himself in Hindi. When they were dissatisfied with his fluency, they instructed him to "entertain" them by performing a "naked dance" due to his Naga ethnicity. The victim could only identify the tormentors by their fluent Hindi.

The victim was threatened into stripping in front of them, despite his pleas. He suspects that the perpetrators may have recorded a video of the incident on their phones. When he could no longer endure the torture and broke down before them, the seniors issued serious threats.

The following morning, the victim left the hostel campus and returned to Nagaland, where he filed a formal complaint regarding the matter. In response, the Naga Students' Union (NSU) in Shillong wrote to NEHU's Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Prabha Shankar Shukla, urging immediate action and justice for the victim within 24 hours.

The NSU outlined several actions the authorities should take, including legal action and filing an FIR, facilitating the victim's transfer to another central university offering the same course, implementing strict disciplinary measures against the perpetrators in line with university anti-ragging policies and relevant laws, expelling the offenders, and transparent communication from the university. The NSU also called on NEHU to align with UGC's regulations on curbing ragging and strengthening community-building efforts.

Chiran Shimrah, the president of the student body, condemned the incident, stating, "Such an undisciplined and heinous incident has brought great shame to the student community and should never be encouraged elsewhere." He warned that if the university failed to take appropriate action, the NSU would call for strikes and boycotts against NEHU.

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