“With great freedom comes great responsibility.”
The BITS Pilani, Pilani Campus is known for its student-centric environment that provides freedom of movement and expression to all its residents. While that has always been the case, certain new measures have sparked tension amongst the student body.Frisking at the main gate, random room inspections, and verification calls for leaves have made students feel scrutinised and monitored in their own homes.
The UGC Guidelines on the safety of students on campuses of higher educational institutions state requirements such as the presence of secure walls, security guards and CCTV cameras, along with the examination of bags and belongings of students in order to secure a “weapon-free and violence-free campus.” Frisking of personnel or room inspections of students, however, have not been explicitly mentioned anywhere. While these measures were customary procedures pre-COVID, and aren’t new to BITS Pilani, they have become more apparent in recent times.
With additional verification calls to parents to approve leave applications, some students questioned if it were standard practice and whether there were any set guidelines and formal criteria for the same. The English Press Club (EPC) sat down with Prof. Meghana Tare, the warden of Meera Bhawan since 2023, to get some insight into this matter. She explained that calling parents to verify leaves was not a new rule and had always existed. She cited a few cases where the parents had been unaware of approved leaves and had later raised concerns. To avoid this, a more systematic verification approach had been implemented. Prof. Tare revealed that these calls were made only if the signature looked suspicious or if the form appeared to have been edited, at the warden’s discretion. She pointed out that this was the case for all hostels–the boys’ and Meera alike.
She further stated that any addition to the college security and safety protocol was done with the consultation of the Student Welfare Division. It also involved the Dean-Administration and other relevant authorities, although it was unclear if there had been any student representation in the decision-making.
The protocol, initially established in 2013 under ‘Guidelines for dealing with Student Indiscipline and Misconduct Cases’, was later revised in Semester-I 24-25. One of the notable additions was the imposition of warnings and fines for failure to open the room upon demand of the Warden or ‘any other competent authority’, as determined by the institute,hereby, granting it inspection authority. Historically, rule revisions hadn’t always been restrictive. For example, the hostel in-time restrictions on the residents of Meera Bhawan, which curbed them from traversing the campus after 11:30 PM, were removed after the “Pinjra Tod” protests in 2017.
To ease the tension and reduce misunderstandings between the administration and the students, Prof. Tare suggested that students communicate with their parents before a leave application, follow official guidelines and raise concerns through proper channels.
The EPC also had the opportunity to interview Kishore Singh, the Chief Security Officer (CSO), to learn more about how campus security had evolved over the years. He recalled that at the start of his term at BITS Pilani in June 2014, there was only the position of an Assistant Security Officer, and an outdated security system that had not kept pace with the changes that BITS had undergone since its advent. He further explained that traffic management was poor, causing several safety hazards, and that he had been hired to help combat these issues.
Mr Singh elaborated that one of the primary concerns was access management. Due to the unregulated nature of the numerous campus gates and the lack of fencing on the walls, thievery was rampant. Of these gates, only two had CCTV surveillance. The official stickers required by vehicles to gain entry onto campus were handed out indiscriminately, undermining their legitimacy. On top of this, the main gate consisted of only a single table, which was shifted away to a nearby shade when it rained. The CSO said that, as a result, the movement of outsiders was not documented appropriately, and unauthorised substances could be smuggled in unnoticed.
To tighten this lax system, his first actions had been to increase the manpower at the gates, construct the current shade, and station guards at circles to help ease the flow of traffic. He followed that by making the old vehicle stickers obsolete and introducing a strict procedure for obtaining an updated one.
The blockades erected during professional shows were also introduced during his tenure. The CSO elaborated, ‘The students tried their best to handle the situation, but the lack of a proper system impeded them.’ The new gating system enabled safer entry into concerts by dividing the crowd into manageable groups and allowing these groups to pass one by one.
Mr Singh described that his first two years were the toughest. The sudden changes he had implemented were hard for people to adjust to, and fights broke out on campus every day. He mentioned that despite that, the continued support he received from the Director at that time, Prof. G Raghurama, the Deans, and the Students’ Union helped him further his efforts to improve campus safety. He added that he worked directly under the Director and regularly reported to him about the changes and new developments in campus safety and security.
The CSO revealed that as time passed, people developed faith in the system, and the tension started to ease. Both the students and the residents of Pilani started following the protocols set in place. He expressed that his biggest concerns at the moment were the smoking at C’not Place and the increase in vehicles on campus. Mr Singh explained that since the beginning of his tenure at BITS, the population must have doubled, yet the roadways have remained unchanged.
As a concluding remark, the CSO shared that he did not want to claim credit for any changes that had been carried out under his watch, and that he had simply been ‘helping update an old system.’ To the students, he stressed the importance of making the most of this ‘golden period’ in their lives at university, away from ‘bad influences’. He noted that after the COVID-19 pandemic, he had ‘unfortunately observed an increase in rule–breaking tendencies’ from students. He reiterated that they should consider studying at BITS Pilani a great opportunity since it had not solely been their hard work, but also that of their peers and parents, that had brought them here.