A second year MBBS student of Coimbatore Medical College (CMC) has petitioned the Anti Ragging Cell, New Delhi, to protect his juniors from being ragged on campus.
The student, who prefers not to be identified, told The Hindu (over phone) that ragging was prevalent in all government medical colleges.
“But nobody is ready to lodge a complaint,” he said and recalled that shock was in store for several MBBS aspirants like him when they stepped into the college on September 1, 2015.
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He alleged that seniors asked him and his first year friends not to wear vests, forced them to wear only formals in the hostel and to stay away from the ground and co-curricular activities.
He said new students were even beaten for no reason. “We were asked to leave our hostel rooms unlocked at night. A few drunk seniors used to take us to their rooms and beat us. We were even forced to buy liquor and cigarette for them and were forced to drink,” he said.
On writing to the Anti-Ragging Cell a year after he was allegedly ragged, he said that it was aimed at putting an end to ragging. “If young MBBS aspirants are not ragged they will, in turn, be good to their juniors,” he said.
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The boy said that these issues were taken to the notice of the chief warden of the hostel and the college authorities last year itself and they took stringent steps for about a week.
Dean of Coimbatore Medical College Hospital (CMCH) A. Edwin Joe said that this year a separate block had been set aside for first year students and seniors had been denied access to that block at the hostel. This was strictly monitored by the anti ragging committee of the college.
“The mobile number of the dean and representatives of the committee are displayed at prominent places in the college and hostel,” he said.