The pandemic is slowly climbing the exponential curve and the future seems highly uncertain, but the institute administration has been sending out continuous emails to students, with guidelines and directives against COVID-19. Check out our conversation with the Director himself, as he enumerates the current state of preparations and how anxiety and impatience can be detrimental to it, along with possible solutions and what lies ahead.
Given the scare of COVID-19, what steps have been taken by the institute and what is their predicted effectiveness?
Firstly, all the steps that we have taken have been taken by consultation with the district epidemiologist and doctors at the Institute’s health center. When the first few cases were reported in India, we were advised to identify and screen all the people who had a recent travel history abroad, including students and faculty. We took the required measures and identified about 50 such people, and some samples were taken and sent for a test.
When the virus started spreading, we decided to extend the vacation and we advised all the students who were at their home to not come back until further notice. The students who had not gone home or who had already come back were appropriately screened. We also quarantined the students, faculty, and staff who had an international travel history. It was predicted that in the coming weeks, we will enter into the third and fourth stages of community transmission of the virus. If that happens, it would become really difficult for us to control it because there are a large number of students in hostels.
Taking all this into view, we decided to vacate the hostels because as of now, students can still travel safely back to their homes, but if we are any later, it would become really hard to even travel back home because of the community transmission. We have also spoken to Northern Railways and that is why we have set up a helpline for students who might face problems in ticket booking. We have asked the DOSA to collect a list of all such students. We will give a list of the students and their destinations to Kanpur Railway Station and manage the reservations. Students who cannot travel due to medical reasons can approach the DOSA and such cases would be dealt with individually. Students who have financial issues will also be helped. In all these cases, we have taken decisions keeping in view how the disease is progressing in the country, what are its expected rate of progression in the future and the advice we got from the professionals.
When we start again, we will have a large influx of students from across the nation and also various workers on the campus, and handling them would be a challenge. And even by then, we won’t be sure about the complete eradication of the virus. So, what is the current state of preparedness of the institute for that?
So the current date of restarting is 31st March, but considering the situation, the break would probably get extended for a couple more weeks. But whatever date is decided, we will give students a time of a week beforehand, so that we don’t see a sudden incoming of a large number of students. We will also have a screening facility and will try to screen every person who comes back. We have had discussions about this with the doctors at the health center. The arrangements would probably be made at the entrance of each hostel. We might give special considerations to unwell students. We had called a senate meeting and set up a subcommittee which is making a contingent plan to cover up all the lost classes. Many options are being discussed, like shortening the end-semester exams to 2 hours or to resort to a combination of online courses and extra classes. The committee will suggest the options, and we will take the steps accordingly to reduce the inconvenience to both the students and the faculty.
Is there any chance that the semester would get extended? A lot of students have their summer internships around this time, who might face some loss if that happens.
See it is very uncertain to say anything now. But we will try our best to minimize any loss to the students. And talking about internships, we have a special internship program with New York University for which they had already selected the students. But they wrote back to us yesterday that they would have to cancel the internships this time. So even if everything becomes normal by May, they have already canceled the internships. Since we are living in such uncertain times, it is not possible to predict whether the students selected for internships would even be able to do them. Our focus would be to compress the semester, as far as possible. But if the situation worsens, we can’t say anything.
There have been numerous incidents where people have disobeyed the instructions given by authorities, like people trying to enter the campus after the advisory or people refusing to leave the campus. What measures have been taken in this regard?
I would actually want to appeal to the students through Vox Populi to adhere to the instructions given by the authorities. All these decisions are being made after long consultations and meetings, with the intention to help the students. We might have made a judgmental error, but the intention is only to help the students. Everyone, including the faculty and staff, should respect the decisions. The decision to quarantine people who have had an international travel history was not only for students but also for the faculty. By large, everyone has complied with the decisions but some instances of either students or faculty members or staff members not adhering to the instructions have been brought to the notice of either the Dean of Student Affairs or the Dean of Faculty Affairs. I would just want everyone to cooperate. It is in the best interest of everyone. We always have to be prepared for the worst.
With the state government announcing financial support to daily wage workers, is the institute also working on the same lines for the mess and sanitation workers who are out of work because of the crisis?
Many faculty members are willing to contribute, so we are thinking of creating an account under the DORA office. We will be sending out an appeal to students, faculty members, and staff to contribute. Whatever amount is collected, the institute from its internal resources would triple it. And then that will be given as a subsistence allowance to the workers. They might not get back their salary exactly but we will do our best to give them the most we can.*
“Prevent but don’t panic”- This is an important message in these difficult times. Do you have any message for the campus community or advice for the students who are at their homes?
We have been continuously telling the campus community that they don’t have to panic, just follow the proper hygiene practices. This applies to everyone, even students at their homes. You don’t have to roam around wearing a mask, just proper hygiene practices would be sufficient. We also want the campus residents to comply with all the instructions which are issued by the doctors and institute authorities from time to time. In such times of emergency, if we don’t go by the rules, it will only create chaos. We are here to help everyone; you just have to follow the instructions.
Credits: Aditya Trivedi, Akshay Bajaj (Externally), Dravya Marwah
*Also, there are several daily wage workers in Mess, Gym, Swimming pool, etc. (roughly 1000 to 1100 in number with a typical monthly wage of a worker ranging from Rs. 15,000 to Rs. 18,000) who will lose their wages because of the lock-down, at a time when they will need the money the most with COVID-19 pandemic staring at the face of all of us. In view of this temporary loss of work, it is proposed to collect donations from faculty, staff, and students which can be disbursed as an ad hoc honorarium directly to their bank accounts that can partially take care of their families in such difficult times. Please contribute.
Name- Endowment Fund Account, IIT Kanpur Number- 10426004735 Bank- SBI Branch- IIT Kanpur, 208016 IFS Code- SBIN0001161 SWIFT Code- SBININBB499 Also, please send a mail to ar_dora@iitk.ac.in detailing the contribution.
