Premier institute not so premier with Dalits

Students from SC & STs poorly represented in the clubs, claims Dalit alumnus who never made it to any of the clubs

NT Correspondent

Bengaluru: A Dalit alumnus of IIM Beng aluru, who earned his MBA in the year 2018 has claimed that he never got an opportunity to be a part of the students’ clubs on campus, despite qualifying with all the requirements. He added that it was not an isolated incident.

“Students from Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe communities are poorly represented in the students’ clubs,” he said to The Telegraph, requesting to be anonymous. Normally, after admissions, the new batch of students will have to go through a series of scrutinies after applying to a particular club. Senior club members interview them and more often than not, ask them to write an article or essay.

“I had believed that they would give adequate representation to students from all sections of society in each and every forum of the institute. I applied for the Bharat club, which focuses on public policy issues. I cleared the interview and wrote an article but my seniors did not select me,” he represented.

He said that the IIM had no policy or a mechanism through which they could ensure that students from various backgrounds can be equally represented in these clubs. Nor does it have an Equal Opportunity Cell (EOC), as mandated by the UGC for all higher education institutions to which students discriminated against can take their grievances.

The various students’ clubs, may it be the cultural club or the marketing club, organise events and conduct projects, including many discussions. A membership at one of them helps the candidate during the placements as it is considered a mark of leadership.

Various faculty members from IIM Bangalore have also acknowledged that most of the students’ clubs continue to have close to zero or low representation of students coming from SC, ST, and OBC communities.

They have also noted that this is a feature of six older IIMs located in Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Calcutta, Indore, Lucknow and Kozhikode, which they explained do not have a forum likethe EOC or any other policy in place to acknowledge and resolve representation issues.

The UGC (Promotion of Equity in Higher Educational Institutions) Regulations explain that every institute of higher education must have an EOC, where a professor acts as an antidiscrimation officer too and addresses the complaints of discrimination against SC, ST, OBC and minority students. While the new 14 IIMs have been equipped with EOCs, the older IIMs are lagging behind.

IIM Bangalore director Rishikesha T Krishnan has replied saying that the institute had an Institute Diversity and Inclusion committee to address all matters relating to diversity. “Reflecting international best practice, we have an Institute Diversity and Inclusion Committee. Diversity is today seen as multidimensional covering caste/ category, gender, disability, etc.

This Institute committee oversees issues related to all aspects of diversity and inclusion,” Krishnan wrote to Telegraph after their queries. He has added that the institute has not received any complaints regarding the matter.

“We have several mechanisms for sharing grievances including the D&I committee, a whistle-blower policy (that ensures that any grievances are addressed maintaining anonymity) and an internal committee. As an institute, IIM-B has zero tolerance towards any kind of discriminatory behaviour,” Krishnan has said.