Waseema Masood stands up for all women facing similar predicament as her
Sexual Harassment, Student Failed For Raising Voice
Srinagar: In a shocking case of victimisation, a female student of the Government Dental College in Srinagar has been repeatedly failed in examinations for raising her voice against alleged sexual harassment and other misdemeanours by some members of the faculty.
Despite the trauma of being failed again and again for her outspoken behaviour, Waseema Masood a final year student, has fought back spiritedly, even to the extent of convincing the vice chancellor of the university about the faculty’s entrenched bias and prejudice against her through a secret video recording of her latest examination.
With an inquiry ordered by the VC pending because of a fresh examination notified by the controller at the Kashmir University late in 2010, which left her with no choice but to appear to save her career, Masood pleaded for an impartial observer to oversee the process, which the VC granted, but the faculty refused him entry into the centre, darkening her chances of success still further.
In her latest salvo after having been failed at least four times in a row, she approached the courts, which accepted the misdemeanours of the faculty, and ordered a senior professor to supervise her examination and asked the police to ensure her security.
Her ordeal began in July 2009 when she and other classmates were declared unsuccessful in several subjects after having held protests against violence against students and indecent advances by members of the faculty.
According to a KNS report, the students have named the college principal, Dr. Riyaz Farooq, and the head of the oral surgery department, Dr. Aijaz Ahmad Shah, as involved in sexual harassment of students, and alleged that the faculty members had hatched a conspiracy to get even with those who raised their voice against it.
Appearing in an internal exam in October 2009, Masood had approached the varsity VC again, pleading for an impartial examiner to be appointed as she feared that the faculty of her college would fail her again.
But the controller of examinations who was ordered to supervise the examination allegedly did not take the assignment seriously and confined himself to a cursory visit of the centre.
Needless to say, the student was failed again despite her good performance.
According to the student, the faculty has not mended its ways, and appeared in no mood to comply with the orders of the court her latest efforts had yielded, and there appeared to be no check on her erring teachers and examiners despite the documented proof she had provided of their wrongdoing. (Kashmir Observer)