Unsafe Campuses, Unanswered Questions: Who Protects Our Girls?

A campus is meant to be a place of learning, curiosity, and growth. Yet for many young women, it is also a place of calculation of routes, of timings, of risks. Before choosing a course, they often end up choosing safety. Before speaking up, they measure consequences. Before walking across campus, they scan their surroundings. For many, education comes with an invisible cost, the cost of staying silent, adjusting, or simply enduring.

Let us begin with a story. There is a student, bright, capable, full of promise. The kind of student teachers remember. The kind who once participated actively, stayed engaged, and dreamed without hesitation. And then, slowly, things begin to change. She starts skipping classes. She avoids certain corridors, certain people, certain timings. Her participation fades into silence. Not because she has lost interest in education or ambition, but because someone has taken away her sense of safety. What makes this reality even more difficult is that, from the outside, everything appears normal. She still attends college occasionally. She still smiles when required. She still submits assignments and tries to blend into routine life. But internally, she is constantly calculating risks which route feels safer, whom to avoid, whether speaking up would invite judgment rather than support. This story is not rare. It is simply rarely spoken about.

Across campuses, countless young women experience different forms of harassment and intimidation that often go unnoticed or unaddressed. Sometimes it is verbal harassment disguised as “casual comments.” Sometimes it is persistent stalking, inappropriate messages, sexist remarks, unwanted attention, or subtle intimidation in classrooms and public spaces. At times, the fear does not even come from one major incident, but from the exhausting accumulation of small moments that continuously remind girls to stay alert.

The conversation around “unsafe campuses” often stays limited to extreme incidents, assaults that make headlines. What remains largely invisible are the everyday forms of harassment that quietly shape how girls experience education. Because harassment on campuses is not always loud. Often, it is subtle, repetitive, and deeply normalized. It begins with something many dismiss as harmless comments. A passing remark on a girl’s body, her clothes, or her character. Laughter disguised as “jokes” that carry sexist undertones. Catcalling in corridors or whispers in classrooms. These are rarely reported, but they accumulate. Over time, they send a clear message: you are being watched, judged, and reduced.

Then comes the more direct forms of sexual harassment. Unwanted touching in crowded spaces, persistent advances despite refusal, coercion masked as affection, or the misuse of authority by seniors or faculty. Here, power plays a dangerous role. The fear is not just about the act itself but about consequences. Speaking up can mean backlash, disbelief, or even academic disadvantage.

In today’s campuses, harassment does not end at the gate. It follows girls into their phones. Screenshots are taken without consent, images are morphed, private conversations are leaked, and anonymous messages turn abusive. The digital world has made harassment more invasive. There is no clear boundary where a girl can feel completely safe.

There is also the quiet terror of being followed. Stalking, whether in person or online, rarely leaves evidence dramatic enough for immediate action. But its impact is profound.

Yet, one of the most damaging forms of harassment is institutional. When a complaint is met with delay, dismissal, or doubt, the message is clear: silence is safer. Many girls are asked what they were wearing, why they were out late, or why they didn’t “handle it quietly.” In those moments, the system that is supposed to protect them becomes part of the problem.

Adding to this is moral policing, rules that restrict women in the name of safety. Early hostel curfews, dress codes, limitations on movement. These measures do not challenge perpetrators, they control potential victims. Safety becomes synonymous with restriction, and freedom becomes conditional.

And perhaps the most isolating layer is social. When girls speak up, they often face rumours, character judgment, or exclusion. The fear of being labelled or ostracized keeps many from reporting what they endure.

This is the reality of harassment on campuses. It is not a single act but a continuum. From words to actions, from peers to institutions, from physical spaces to digital ones, it exists in layers.

We take pride in building world-class institutions, but hesitate to ask a basic question: how safe are these spaces for the very students they claim to empower?

The reality tells a harsher story.

From hostel rooms to classrooms, from complaint cells to administrative corridors, there exists a gap between reporting and justice. Students often hesitate to speak, not because they lack courage, but because they lack trust. Trust that their voices will be heard. Trust that their identities will be protected. Trust that the accused will face consequences. And when that trust collapses, silence becomes survival.

Odisha today stands at a crossroads. Data and incidents point toward a larger systemic concern around women’s safety not just in public spaces, but within institutions meant to empower them. The question is no longer whether campuses are unsafe. The question is, why are they still unsafe despite repeated warnings? Who protects our girls when the very systems meant to safeguard them turn indifferent?

The answer cannot be limited to CCTV cameras, security guards, or helpline numbers. Safety is not infrastructure, it is accountability. It is swift action. It is institutional courage to stand with the victim, not shield the powerful. Because real safety is not about surveillance or restriction. It is about accountability. It is about systems that respond without bias, act without delay, and stand firmly with those who speak.

Across the state, complaints of harassment, abuse, and institutional neglect are no longer isolated incidents. Official acknowledgements point to multiple cases of sexual, mental, and behavioural abuse reported by girl students across universities and colleges. What is more disturbing is not just the existence of these cases but the silence, delay, and denial that often follow.

If harassment on campuses is layered and persistent, the response cannot be symbolic or reactive. Safety cannot be reduced to a few guards at the gate or a helpline number that rarely answers. What is needed is a structural shift. One that treats safety not as a “women’s issue,” but as an institutional responsibility. Because the real question is not what happened? it is what will be done differently now.

Most institutions already have mechanism like the Internal Complaints Committee (ICC), mandated under the Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act, 2013. But on many campuses, these bodies exist more on paper than in practice. Committees must be independent, gender-sensitive, and time-bound in their responses. Every complaint should have a clear process, strict deadlines, and visible outcomes. Justice delayed in such cases is not neutral, it is discouraging.

 

Mandatory gender sensitization, beyond token workshops

One-off seminars do little to change deeply ingrained attitudes. Gender sensitization must be continuous, practical, and compulsory for students, faculty, and administrative staff alike. Conversations around consent, respect, and power dynamics need to be embedded into campus culture, not treated as occasional awareness drives.

The first response to a complaint often determines whether a case moves forward or dies in silence. Faculty and administrators must be trained to handle disclosures with sensitivity, not skepticism. Victim-blaming questions, dismissive attitudes, or informal “settlements” should have zero tolerance.

Mental health support must be integrated

Harassment does not end with the incident, it lingers. Anxiety, isolation, academic decline, and trauma often follow. Campuses must provide accessible counselling services and long-term support systems for survivors.

If campuses are to truly become spaces of learning and freedom, safety cannot be an afterthought. It must be built into the foundation, visible in policy, felt in culture, and proven through action.

Until a girl feels as free as she is expected to be ambitious, our campuses will remain unequal spaces.