One More Light: Why Can't We Normalise Failing?

As a student, I want to put my head in a pillow and scream my heart out. As a writer, I am doomed to write words that not many will read and even fewer will understand. As a journalist, I am required to piece together what happened and inform the community of the cold chain of events of last night. But I choose to write this article as a human being, one who is confused and terrified and angry.

Chain of events

My WhatsApp started buzzing with some concerning messages and initially, I didn’t pay much heed. Hostel groups are known to be unruly and wild. But the messages didn’t stop. I slept early yesternight as I was fatigued and woke up to the confirmation of the demise of a 4th year B. Tech student in my hostel.

Almost all students are not present on campus as vacations are going on except for students staying back for summer/pending courses or projects. I am sitting 1500 km away from campus as I write this. Thus, although it is very difficult to get a clear picture and to separate fact from fiction in the sea of rumours, it seems like the boy hung himself in his room. It has also been suggested that the incident happened 2-3 days ago and it was only discovered yesternight.

I got another message from a senior. The statements were fragmented but seemed genuine. Along with the gruesome descriptions, there was this picture.

Image removed to preserve privacy of the deceased.

This was supposedly the list of pending courses of the deceased. Now, it should be noted that the outgoing batch generally completes their course requirements by 7th semester (out of 8 total semesters for a 4 year programme). The last semester is mostly for some minor courses for a max of 10 credits. That’s how students plan. That’s how the system is designed. Unless, of course, one fails a course for some reason in which case they have to repeat it. As you can see above, the guy had 5 such pending courses. Moreover, there are a bunch of other requirements for the degree like completion of a certain amount of social work measured in hours (“Bhai ghante mile tujhe?”; Bro did you get the hours?), industry experience - typically interning at a company gets the job done and a bunch of other elective courses.

To be honest, I was gobsmacked by looking at this and estimated that he would have to stay back for at least one more year and then it hit me. Imagine this guy attending classes while all his batchmates graduate and get employed. It is often said that college is where one makes their own identity and their own way in life but trust me, once those instagram posts and linkedin posts of convocation ceremony and office pictures start pouring in then all hell breaks loose. And who would quantify this? Who can quantify this?

In vain, yet green

I scrolled through the guy’s Linkedin and there was this innocent face staring at me. I was eerily discomforted because the “Connect” button on Linkedin showed active and I was mortified by the irony of it. I couldn’t imagine what must have prevailed in his mind before he took such a drastic decision. And I cannot imagine what is stopping hundreds of others still in the system?

I clicked on the followers list and clicked on one of his connections, a passed out senior I know who is working in a decent company abroad with a handsome paycheck and I began to wonder what difference was there between these two? One who is on his way to a lifestyle millions in our country dream of and another hopeless enough to end his life and yet borne out of the same system that has bred engineers through the years. A distinct distastefulness of life played up on my tongue as I kept scrolling through, once again face to face with the morbid and selfish reality of our time. One who can endure prevails over one who is weak at heart or conscience. But then the question that remains to be asked is this: Was it really any fault of the weak to be that way?

I tried reaching out to people in the graduating batch from my hostel hoping to get a lead on a friend who might shed some light on the incident only to discover that the guy had no friends at all in the hostel. He was a loner. Why wasn’t I surprised? Let people say what they want to but the strenuous demands of the curriculum at IIT takes a toll on every student. Social life is one of the ways to diffuse that tension and keep going. I wondered what kept this guy going for all these years? And that’s how I met a dead-end in my investigation of the matter.

Truthfulness of truth

During the past few hours, I have pondered on some interesting questions in my capacity as an editor too. Deep questions about the truthfulness of truth and how no account is ever true enough. I have engaged in a lot of debate and discussion on this with the editorial panel only for the panel to arrive at the impossibility of ever learning the truth if the administration decides to censor it. Questions were also raised in my mind about the potency and effectiveness of a media body that is powerless to gather information.

IITs are pockets of excellence carefully designed to train the talent of our country to serve the global markets for labour. This is not the first suicide at one and I’m sorry to say, neither will this be the last. Unless we stop going to candle light vigils and putting up social media stories, thereby convincing ourselves that our responsibility is somehow over. Maybe it will make us feel better today. Maybe very deep in our heart, we’ll be comforted by the fact that it was not someone we knew; a deep-seated psychological mechanism called “proximity principle” which biases us towards caring for people closest to us. But how long till it’s someone we know?

Why can’t we normalise failing?

Imagine the shame of admitting to one’s parents: “Papa, mein fail kar gaya. Mujhe naukri nahi mili.” (“Dad, I failed to graduate. I didn’t get a job”). There is nothing wrong in failing a course. You cannot judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree. But that’s how we are conditioned and brought up. Employment is such an important metric to gauge social status that students are subtly deluded into the joy of getting a job. Most students, thus, wait anxiously for their degree to “just end”.

It is shameful to fail. It is shameful to not get a goddamn job. But it is not shameful to become a Third World cog in a global machine designed1 to transfer our wealths to the shores of the First World.

“Our system acts very much like a sponge, drawing up all the good things from the banks of the Ganges, and squeezing them down on the banks of the Thames”
~John Sullivan, Revenue Board Prez, Madras

Except it is no more indigo and spices but dreams and imagination.

In parting

I have spoken and you might have listened and now I’ll go back to my life and you’ll go to yours. But these questions will remain hanging heavy in the air. We might choose to ignore them because we don’t have any answers and yet there will be questions of morality and justice and humanity. The questions will remain unanswered.