Opinion: Through hell and back in Jadavpur University

"Why does she talk like that?" Snigger, a look of disdain, another snigger, and a few thinly-veiled laughs. It was Jadavpur University, circa 2011. I had asked an autorickshawala, "8B jaba? (Will you go to 8B?)" 'Jaba' was my colloquial Cooch Behar Bangla that slipped out in a stray moment. The Kolkata word was 'jabey'. I did not notice the group of seniors who had followed me out of the university gates to confirm something they were curious about: if underneath all that Delhi University shimmer, I was one of them or the other.

Truth is, I was an outsider, quite like Nadia’s Swapnodeep Kundu, who fell to his death from the Jadavpur University hostel earlier this week. His death is being investigated, with the university and police authorities trying to figure out what was behind it.

My home too was far from Kolkata, half a thousand miles from the Bengal capital, in one dark corner of the state that the capital never chose to acknowledge. But that was perhaps all of North Bengal. There was always a divide between North and South but nowhere is it as stark as in Kolkata.

So, when this group of students overheard me talking in the Cooch Behar Bangla, my mofussil status was confirmed.

The humidity that day was stifling but the flush on my face was hardly the July heat. It was rage, tinged red with embarrassment. Many a time I wondered why I had to leave Delhi and move to Kolkata for my studies. But crises are such. They make you take up things you never want to.

In my very first week in Jadavpur, it was clear that I was unwelcome. There were anyway just about 15 'outsiders' in that first year MA English class. Against 50/55 Jadavpur English passouts, we were the 'minority'. Then there was my cursed accent. Week after week, I tried to talk in a Bangla that did not come naturally, just to escape those looks. I had spent 17 years speaking my kind of Bangla, the frowned-upon Bangla, and then spent three years at Delhi University where no one cared where you were from or what you spoke. All that mattered was what you wanted to do with your life. There was no alienation, no othering, no discrimination. There were no raised eyebrows nor condescending glances if you pronounced a word 'wrong'.

Well.

In Jadavpur, it was different. Very different. There was a lot of politics. We were warned against staying in the university hostel. The horror stories of ragging and drugs were enough to discourage any parent from putting their kid in the hostel. So, we chose a PG near the 8B bus stand, a few minutes' auto-ride from the campus, and my life in Kolkata began. Little did I know that I was not even going to last two months!

The political, educational and general structure of Jadavpur University is haywire. You will find many 'Dadas' and 'Didis' who have passed out years ago but could never do anything worthwhile with their lives save for bullying the average 'outsider'. These 'seniors' are the de facto heads of the hostel committees. Not a leaf can flutter in the campus without their approval. Hostellers are bullied day in and day out, so much, that occasionally some choose to end their life. Peer pressure makes you take up addictions from Dendrite to weed lest you anger a 'senior'. The professors are at best aloof.

In my brief time at the university, my roommate's boyfriend killed himself because he was forced to consume drugs by his hostel seniors and he landed up at the hospital. When his parents found out, they took him back home to Bishnupur and cut him off from the world. Two days later, he hanged himself.

That suicide shook something inside me. A week later, I decided to leave Jadavpur, and Kolkata, forever. My parents were supportive enough to let me drop out. Not everyone's is.

The stories are many. There are Swapnodeep Kundus all over Jadavpur University, who come with dreams of making it big in life, or escaping their smalltown lives for the glitter of Kolkata. That glitter is a mirage most of the time. It melts into thin air the moment your foolish tongue says 'jaba'.