Indian Institutes of Technology across the country will now have wellness centres on campuses to help students deal with stress, reported PTI. The decision, which was taken at a meeting of the IIT Council on Friday, comes after an increase in the number of suicides that have been taking place on the premier institute’s campuses.
“All IITs will now have wellness centres to help students deal with mental stress due to high academic and peer pressure. They will offer remedial courses,” Human Resources Development Minister Prakash Javadekar said. Besides, an induction programme will be organised to help freshers adjust to the atmosphere of the college.
The IIT Council also decided to provide a 20% quota to female students as it has been found that out of 4,500 girls who crack the Joint Entrance Exam-Advanced, only 800 of them enrol in various courses. These additional seats are being created “to ensure that their participation goes up to 20% from 8%,” Javadekar said.
Some of the decisions taken by former HRD Minister Smriti Irani – such as the decision to hike tuition fees by 122%, and giving concessions to special category students – were also discussed during Friday’s meeting. Moreover, proposals such as getting IITs on board as a NAAC-like accreditation agency, hiking fees for post-graduate courses by six times were also discussed in the meeting, PTI reported.
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