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Student suicides in India lead to words of caution

Senior church officials warn parents to ease up on pressuring their children
Student suicides in India lead to words of caution

Indian children stand at attention at a school in New Delhi. The highly pressurized environment of India's school has led to a crisis of student suicides, senior church officials said. (Photo by Ritu Sharma)

Published: May 11, 2016 09:45 AM GMT
Updated: May 11, 2016 09:59 AM GMT

Parental pressure on children to excel in school is a major cause of student suicides in India, senior church officials said.

"Parents want results from their children because they are spending so much on their studies and if a child fails he or she finds it difficult to face them and resort to extreme steps," Father Joseph Manipadam, secretary of the Catholic Bishops' Conference of India's office of education and culture, told ucanews.com.

Blind pursuit of parents to decide their children's career is a very dangerous trend, the priest said.

He was speaking against the backdrop of the April 28 suicide of a 17-year-old girl in Kota district in northern Rajasthan state, who was forced to take up engineering due to pressure from her parents.

A five-page suicide note came to light May 10 in which she said she liked writing, English and history and blamed her mother for "manipulating me as a kid to take up science. … I took science to make you happy."

The girl was attending a coaching institute in Kota to help her pass the national-level entrance exam for engineering.

Kota, which boasts of 40 such coaching institutes, where some 150,000 students take admission every year, witnessed 30 student suicides last year.

According to a data by the National Crime Records Bureau, there was a 26.58 percent increase in the number of students committing suicide in India between 2012 and 2013. The number went up from 6,654 in 2012 to 8,423 in 2013.

Father Manipadam said the coaching centers these days place too much pressure on students to perform because the schools want good results in order to attract more children.

The priest said that apart from this, the country's "examination boards too continue to burden students with an extremely loaded curriculum."

He said young students deserve guidance that helps them match up their skills and interests.

Sister Jaya Peter, who runs a school for slum children in New Delhi, told ucanews.com that every parent wants their children to get good salaries.

"After a point, the career of the child becomes a prestige issue for the parents which is a very dangerous trend for our society and future generations," she said.

Stressing that the child’s interest should be given prime importance, she said parents need to be counseled and convinced to allow their children to follow their heart.

"Counseling should start at the school level itself where the teachers get in discussion with the parents during regular meetings so that children can grow in a healthy and stress-free environment," she said.

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