Prove your grandfather died: IIT Delhi alumnus recalls 2011 ordeal amid protests

After Rishikesh Kumar's death triggered protests at IIT Delhi, alumnus Shashant Shekhar recalled a 2011 incident when he was asked to prove his grandfather's death before getting a re-exam. His account raises a larger question: are institutions training faculty and staff to respond sensitively when students face grief or crisis?After Rishikesh Kumar's death triggered protests at IIT Delhi, alumnus Shashant Shekhar recalled a 2011 incident when he was asked to prove his grandfather's death before getting a re-exam.The death of IIT Delhi MSc Physics student Rishikesh Kumar has prompted protests over how the institute handles student welfare. Now, an alumnus has added a deeply personal account from 2011, where he says he was treated insensitively after losing his grandfather.Shashant Shekhar, an IIT Delhi and IIM Calcutta alumnus, also a Congress worker and former INC candidate from Patna Sahib, recalled the incident in an X post on Tuesday.He said his grandfather died in Patna while he was at IIT Delhi. Shekhar travelled home, attended the funeral and missed two minor examinations.When he returned to campus and asked for a re-examination, he says a professor responded: "You people from Bihar come here on reservation, can’t handle the pressure, then make excuses and kill your grandparents ten times over. Bring me his death certificate." Shekhar says he was 20 at the time. "I was grieving, and the institution I had worked so hard to enter had reduced that grief to paperwork."He says the Dean's office eventually resolved the matter, allowing him to take the examination. He also stressed that his criticism does not erase his gratitude towards IIT Delhi. "IIT Delhi gave me a platform I could never have had otherwise. I will always be grateful for that. But gratitude does not require silence," he writes.Rishikesh's death is also part of a wider string of student suicides reported across IITs and IISc in recent months, intensifying concerns over mental health support and institutional response on elite campuses.The deaths have triggered protests, reviews and calls for stronger intervention, but students and alumni continue to question whether existing systems are reaching those in distress before they reach a crisis point.'ADMINISTRATIVE INDIFFERENCE'Shekhar's post comes after the death of 31-year-old Rishikesh Kumar, an MSc Physics student at IIT Delhi. Students protested on campus following his death, demanding an independent inquiry and greater accountability over student welfare.For Shekhar, the concerns being raised by students today brought back his own experience."The students used a phrase for what they are experiencing: 'Administrative indifference.' I know exactly what they mean," he writes.He argues that institutions can become highly efficient at enforcing academic rules while failing to recognise what a student may be going through outside the classroom. "It is a machine. A machine that knows how to measure CGPAs, cut-offs, placement packages, rankings and deadlines. But somehow never learned how to measure grief."For him, sensitivity does not mean expecting professors or administrative staff to become mental health professionals. It means recognising when a student is vulnerable and responding like a human being before directing them towards paperwork, rules or procedures."Never learned that sometimes, before asking for a certificate, you simply ask: 'Are you okay?'" he writes.That is why Shekhar wants mandatory sensitivity training for faculty and administrative staff, rather than leaving such responses to individual discretion.He also calls for more counsellors on campuses, arguing that one or two counsellors serving thousands of students cannot constitute an adequate mental health system."One or two counsellors for thousands of students is not a mental-health system. It is a formality," he says.But a student in distress may never reach a counsellor. The first person they encounter could be a professor, hostel official, section officer or another administrative employee. How that person responds can determine whether the student feels supported or pushed further away from the institution.Shekhar's argument is not that every professor or administrator intends to hurt students. His concern is that institutions can become so focused on rules, deadlines and academic metrics that staff may not know how to respond when a student is dealing with grief or severe distress.For him, that is precisely why sensitivity training matters: the first person a struggling student encounters may not be a counsellor, but that person's response can still matter enormously.HAS THE GOVERNMENT ALREADY STARTED THIS?There are already government measures aimed at making campuses more responsive to student mental health. But the bigger question is whether these measures change what actually happens when a distressed student walks into a classroom, hostel office or administrative room.Under the Malaviya Mission Teacher Training Programme, the Department of Higher Education has introduced faculty training on positive mental health, resilience, wellbeing, early identification and intervention. The programme covers centrally funded institutions, including IITs. There are also programmes aimed at improving mental health literacy among educators.Meanwhile, the Supreme Court's National Task Force on student mental health and suicide prevention is examining academic pressure, discrimination, financial stress and institutional shortcomings. It has surveyed thousands of institutions and more than 12 lakh students, with its final report due by October 31, 2026.On paper, these measures address many of the concerns raised by students and alumni. The problem is what happens between a policy being issued and a student actually experiencing its benefits.If sensitivity training becomes a module that faculty complete, a certificate that gets filed and a box that gets ticked, but does not change how a professor responds to a grieving student, its purpose is lost.The same applies to counselling systems. An institution can have counsellors on its website and still leave students struggling to find an appointment, unsure whom to approach or afraid that asking for help will affect their academic standing.For students, the test of these measures is not whether an institution can show that a guideline exists. It is whether, at the moment they need help, someone recognises what they are going through and knows what to do next.That is the gap Shekhar's 2011 memory brings back into focus.- EndsPublished On: Aug 25, 2026 16:38 IST