New Delhi: For ages, hazing has been debated and discussed in India but the hidden psychological mysteries associated with the menace have always been ignored.
It has almost been two decades since the country started to recognise hazing as a problem and a hunt for solutions began. But things have not moved much from where they were back then.
As it is, any discussion on the topic eventually turns into a debate on mild versus severe hazing.
According to Delhi-based psychiatrist V. Veeraraghavan, “the reason behind hazing is our failure to inculcate in our youngsters a feeling of respect for people from different backgrounds. As a result, when youngsters go to college, ragging becomes a soft tool to manifest the hatred they nurtured against people from other communities.”
It indeed is a bitter fact to accept that across the country hazing is mainly done along the lines of caste, region, language, religion, economic background and all other different diversities that we have in our society.
“People across the world have the tendency to bully others in order to establish their supremacy. They do so by making fun of someone’s background or certain traits which might be considered ‘funny’. It could be on someone’s physique, accent, economic background or native place. It is all this that has gradually transformed into a psychology; it is this which influences young minds to haze and derive sadistic pleasure,” she adds.
