The death of a dream

Avijit Pathak
Sociologist

When I came to know about Fathima Latheef’s suicide, I realised the pain of my wounded self. Because as a teacher engaging with hundreds of young minds like her, I experienced the tragic end of a possibility: a dream that inspired this bright, young girl from Kerala to come to IIT-Chennai and pursue higher education in philosophy and humanities. It was a dream of self-exploration — a journey to the fascinating world of books, thoughts and ideas; it was a dream of psychic and social mobility. But then, it would be wrong to see Fathima’s story in isolation. As a teacher, I have no hesitation in saying that a suicide reveals many problematic layers of campus life and associated academic practices.

Fathima was bright; or, to put it otherwise, she was ‘topper’ material. Did she experience severe performance anxiety: the constant pressure to excel, and retain the ‘self’ of the topper? I see my own students — bright and dreamy like Fathima — living with terrible pressure. Quite often, in an aspirational society like ours, many of these students come to universities with a heavy baggage of societal expectations. From parents to neighbours to school principals, there seems to be only one lesson they have learned. They have to succeed. Success measured through grades is the assured road to social/economic mobility; and failure is a matter of shame. The site of higher learning has become a war zone, and there is no winner. In a way, everyone is a loser. If you fail, you are condemned and stigmatised. And if you win, you die — psychologically and spiritually — because of the pressure to retain the topper position. And even the slightest fall from that elevated position makes life miserable and meaningless. Is this the reason why in this hyper-competitive/performance-centric academic culture, psychic anxiety and acute loneliness affect the mental health of many young minds?

Furthermore, in many of these centres of excellence, as teachers we put enormous pressure on our students. There is no catharsis, no joy, no celebration in academics. Tutorials, seminars, examinations, books and papers: with absolute mecahanisation and ritualisation, a young learner keeps consuming varieties of knowledge capsules. There is no breathing space; there is no possibility of calmness and mindfulness; there is no communion with the treasure of life — looking at the sky, and experiencing the beauty of idleness. We have transformed young minds into horses in a race. The knowledge they are compelled to acquire does not liberate them; it makes them incapable of meeting the challenges of life with grace and patience. This is the tragic story of our academic culture.

There is yet another factor that needs to be understood. For instance, Fathima’s suicide, as many reports disseminated through social media suggest, indicate the possibility of some sort of psychic/symbolic violence she might have experienced because of her identity, and a problematic relationship with some faculty members. Quite often, in a heterogeneous and highly stratified society like ours, filled with violence emanating from asymmetrical power relations, we hear diverse narratives of victimisation in the name of caste, gender, religion and ethnicity. It is a fairly complex domain, and in the name of finding some conspiracy, if we sensationalise the issue through instant judgement, we would not be able to go deeper. Many studies have revealed that there is no denying the fact that our educational centres do experience what happens in the larger society: the act of humiliating the marginalised and the minorities. Moreover, as teachers, we are not angels, and it may not be altogether impossible to find, say, male/‘forward caste’ teachers from the dominant community conveying the gestures and symbols that humiliate Dalits or the minorities. And for a vulnerable young mind that is at the receiving end, this violence might prove to be fatal.

However, it is equally important to realise that the hyper-sensitivity to this social evil, as well as some sort of reductionist identity politics (implying the belief that never can one see beyond one’s caste or religion), have created a toxic culture of perpetual doubt and suspicion. As a result, we refuse to see that there are limits to stereotypes; and it becomes exceedingly difficult to believe that education is also about the flowering of human possibilities — something beyond one’s caste, gender and religion. And even in this ugly/violent world, there are people who have tried to come out of the arrogance of their privileged positions. But then, in an environment of doubt and chronic suspicion, it is taken for granted that a ‘forward caste’ teacher is bound to be casteist; and a male professor can never escape the psychology of patriarchal violence. This is also some sort of hyper-reaction causing severe damage to the process of creating a culture of trust, reciprocity and dialogue. No meaningful education is possible amid this broken/distorted communication, and perpetual apprehension about one’s motives. This is something that worries me as a teacher.

Every act of suicide reveals our collective failure. Particularly when we fail to prevent a young learner like Fathima from playing with death, as students, teachers and concerned citizens, we all ought to contemplate, and, instead of indulging in sensational politics, try to create a humane/stress-free/inclusive culture of learning that values the uniqueness of every student, and generates warmth and tenderness in interpersonal relationships. This effort would be the most meaningful tribute to Fathima.