Admin Joins the Performative Mail Trend: Ashoka and O.P. Jindal Love Feminist (only in) Theory

On September 23rd, 2025, there was a protest at O.P. Jindal Global University (JGU), Sonipat, regarding persistent threats to women’s safety in and around the campus. In now-widely circulated clips showing a congregation of protesting students outside the JGU Registrar’s office, an administration member is seen shouting: “We have time, this is not a crisis!” An interesting perspective, since it is concerning how much time, indeed, has passed since any real action from the university’s administration has been taken to mitigate a very real crisis—that of the continual threat to students’ safety in Sonipat, particularly at elite liberal arts universities that promise otherwise. 

JGU’s protest was not a lone spark, given that the issue of women’s safety is a persistent problem. In a conversation with The Edict, PKS—an undergraduate student at JGU—expressed her disappointment with JGU and its continual failure to protect the student body. In harrowing detail, she recounts several incidents of male workers harassing, ogling and groping female students, sometimes in their own residence halls, watching them through translucent windows in the bathrooms. Additionally, a much-frequented theka (liquor shop) is stationed 150 meters away from the JGU campus, where local men have catcalled, filmed and harassed female students walking around campus perimeters. The response? “There is an abruptness to accepting the administration’s blasphemy,” PKS sighs with inevitability. She continues that JGU’s Committee on Gender Sensitisation Against Sexual Harassment (COGSASH) and the administration remained woefully unhelpful, apart from the latter sending out superficial mass emails following the protest (sounds familiar, Ashoka?). PKS recounts how COGSASH and the administration have shut down several protests and demands made on this issue in the past, weaponising reports of gender violence against the student body by expelling protesting students, and enacting decisions that do anything but address the problem at hand. Additionally, COGSASH coercively refuses to address workers harassing female students, using non-student residence life parties to explicitly convey that this “does not fall under their purview,” she says. The question then arises: whose jurisdiction does it fall under? 

These incidents at JGU made me think closer to home about how a concerning pattern of sexual harassment is pervasive on our own campus, which is not immune to Ashoka’s “comprehensive security measures” or “vigilant monitoring”. Ashoka maintains that “safety isn’t a question—it’s a promise.” In place are splendid security teams, well-maintained shuttle services and round-the-clock measures to ensure students’ safety at metro stops, campus perimeters, and the like. Indeed, Ashoka does an adequate job protecting its wards from threats outside the campus. But how about the evils lurking within its walls?

Since 2020, there have been several indications of sexual assault and women’s safety being neglected by the administration. Take, for example, this article in The Edict, which highlighted the prevalent and pervasive issue of sexual harassment on campus in 2020. It referred to the “Baruah case,” which involved a faculty member who had multiple charges of sexual assault against him. The article recalls how the student body was assured there was “no facet left unexamined” in the inquiry into Professor Baruah. However, the student body never received enough evidence for the quick dismissal of Baruah’s case, which included manipulative consent and 'patriarchal abuse of power’ at Jawaharlal Nehru University. The professor in question continues to remain full-time faculty as of 2025, teaching a mandatory Foundation Course despite Ashoka University’s official statement also admitting to raising concerns about Professor Baruah’s “conduct not relating to sexual harassment”.

Additionally, as recently as 2024, The Edict confirmed that several Bluspring/Quess Housekeeping female staff were fired after reporting and escalating incidents of sexual harassment by male supervisors. The administration washed its hands of this appalling violation, stating it was an “internal issue to be handled by Quess”. Contrastingly, CASH’s official Policy states that any “aggrieved party” alleging harassment (employed or not) in the workplace falls under their purview. Their jobs are yet to be reinstated as of 2025. If Ashoka proclaims to take “extra precautions to ensure the safety” of off-duty staff, particularly the women in housekeeping and security roles, why was this a non-issue for nearly 2 years, culminating finally in a 14-day workers’ strike? 

As a university that constantly and publicly portrays itself as safe, when members of its student body, staff and faculty consistently report concerning incidents of sexual harassment, there is an important and timely conversation to be held about this so-called safety (and the bodies that “ensure” it).

The bodies tasked with addressing sexual harassment culture—Ashoka’s (CASH) and JGU’s COGSASH—also share their ineptitude: CASH’s process takes around a month for cases to even begin being deliberated upon; they do not conduct effective workshops, have admitted to the perception that CASH does not “do anything”, and remain severely understaffed and lacking in student representation. Speaking to The Edict, Mithali*— an undergraduate student — recounts her experience filing her complaint with CASH, which encompassed a five-month-long delay, blunt responses, a complete lack of emotional support, dismissals of her incident, and unprofessional, investigative lapses. “I still don't know what's happening with the Registrar. As far as I know, my complaint is just sitting at his desk…in the meantime, I still have to see the perpetrator around campus, and I am worried for my safety, most of the time.” Unfortunately, this is not a one-off case: in 2021, the report on Ashoka University Sexual Harassment Climate Survey, an undertaking of the CASH Policy Research team, proved a startling pattern in its results—more than 57% of the student body thought sexual harassment was extremely prevalent at Ashoka. A majority of respondents thought it unlikely that CASH would protect the complainant from further harm by the accused, and 95% did not report their cases to CASH. Despite promises from the university to conduct this survey every two years, this report vanished, although there are talks of it being reinstated in AUSG’s monthly report this year. No reason has been provided for its inaction from 2021-2025. 

A critique of this failing system would be incomplete without clearing the common misunderstanding that CASH is representative of the whole system. In an interview with The Edict, Professor Tatyana Aleksandrovna Kostochka—a member of CASH Support—says that the final decision and action lies with the Vice Chancellor; CASH merely makes recommendations. Hence, the larger issue in both universities would not be the smaller advisory committees, but the larger bodies that ultimately make the decisions (or lack thereof) that affect the student body. I think back to an online seminar I attended before joining Ashoka, aimed at alleviating parent concerns and questions about campus safety. A parent asked the eventual question: considering the ‘reputation’ that precedes Sonipat in terms of women’s safety, is Ashoka University a secure environment to send our children, especially our daughters? A woman from the Ashoka administration swiftly replied that a thana (police station), as well as several police officers, were stationed right outside our gates. Coupled with our committees, organisations and policies, Ashoka was as safe as it could get. 

One year in, I’m not sure I agree with her or JGU’s similar assurances of safety attributed to police presence in now-hidden portions of their website. My description of these two campuses concerning women’s safety was not for the obvious reason that they both are elite, liberal-arts universities situated in Sonipat. It was, instead, for the same reason the woman in my seminar used as assurance: as universities with constant surveillance, patrolling and proximity to police stations, the common thread remains that students, faculty and staff at both universities continue to feel unsafe. Police forces tasked with protecting our free movement are more concerned with checking for students hiding alcohol than stopping inebriated men harassing students near the theka. CASH and COGSASH portray commendable sentiments on social media and websites, but what would be crucial to its actual fulfilment—in contrast to the viral JGU admin response—is timely action. I fervently pray that this article sees some positive action and actual acknowledgement, instead of merely getting lost in The Edict’s repository like the several I consulted for this piece. Sadly, nothing has changed since their publication, but there may be (little) time yet. 

Writing this piece was profoundly depressing; that active threats to my safety could go unpunished, dismissed and ignored terrifies me deeply. However, what is even more terrifying is the thought that these universities may stick to their solely online promises much longer. Until this changes, I may only draw from brave acts like the JGU protest, and hope our demands are loud enough to shake our administrations from their slumber. 

(Edited by Avika Mantri and Madiha Tariq)