'Quid pro quo sexual abuse, post-complaint trauma, suicides'– Why was shocking report on Kerala campuses buried?

The wave of sexual abuse allegations triggered by the release of the Hema Commission report has bared the ugly side of the Malayalam film industry, forcing the Kerala government to initiate a comprehensive probe even though it overlooked the study for five years. This was hardly the first instance of a panel losing its hard labour in the official quagmire.

Nine years ago, a report from the Committee on Gender Justice surfaced with damning instances of sexual abuse and harassment on campuses in Kerala. Despite the severity of the issues enumerated in the report, the perpetrators went scot-free.

The government did not order a probe, although the committee flagged shocking instances like quid-pro-quo sexual harassment by teachers and professional seniors in return for favours and, in some cases, enhancing internal assessment marks.

The report cited cases of post-complaint trauma among women who had dared to file complaints after they did not find support. It also went on record saying that peer harassment and, in some cases, intimate partner harassment and subsequent stigma led to instances of suicides on campuses that had been hushed up. The committee noted an exponential increase in harassment of women research scholars by guides or research supervisors, which can take the form of excessive repression, control or even quid pro quo harassment.

According to a letter sent to the Kerala State Higher Education Council (KSHEC), the committee headed by Meenakshi Gopinath engaged in broad consultations with policymakers, senior education administrators, faculty, staff, and students in open forums and took into account the concerns and issues raised.

"We spent around eight months travelling across college campuses in Kerala. Students came forward and shared their experiences, which we recorded and included in the report. I am not aware of any follow-up action being taken regarding the report. We had protected the identities of the students who opened up," said Ameera VU, assistant professor at MES College, Ponnani, one of the committee members. Sheena Shukkur, the committee's convenor, said that she didn't recall the government taking any action after the report was submitted.

As the vice-chairman of the KSHEC, TP Sreenivasan took the initiative to constitute the committee. "As soon as we got the report with these revelations, we held a meeting of vice-chancellors of all the universities. They denied everything. We held that meeting along with the chairperson of the committee. The VCs were in denial. There was no such case, they said. We left it at that. It was treated as an information report. It was never meant for a confrontation but as a helpful way to address issues. We didn't have the mandate to endorse any action," Sreenivasan said.

One of the committee members said that if the government wanted, they could have acted on the instances mentioned in the report. "While identities were protected, the committee was willing to part with whatever we had collected. But we never heard from any legal authorities or the government," another member said.

Sexual harassment or any other forms of gender violence was one of the issues included in the questionnaire prepared by the committee. In response, it was reported that harassment of scholars by research guides was a serious problem and they spoke about lack of safety and sexual violence.

The committee noted in the report that very often, threats of non-completion by supervisors to women doctoral students led to extreme forms of submission to continued sexual harassment. When it became unbearable, the women scholars preferred to exit the programme rather than take remedial action for fear of stigma and isolation.