Psychology

 Euthanasia Case Harish Rana's story goes beyond being a simple legal landmark. It touches the very core of human psychology, a narrative of suffering, dignity, hope and the impotence of medicine. When the Supreme Court of India allowed passive euthanasia for the 32 year old man who had been in a vegetative state for 13 years, the verdict stirred an uncomfortable yet indispensable debate on the subject of living with dignity when the very state of being conscious is in question.

The Psychological Burden of an Unstable Existence In 2013, Rana was a bright student at Panjab University who suffered a tragic accident when he fell from the fourth floor of a hostel. This resulted in his brain getting damaged beyond repair. Since then, he has been in the condition of permanent vegetative state, a state without any means of communication, movement or self dependence.

A vegetative state is when the body keeps doing the essential biological functions like breathing, blood circulation digestion etc. but the brain functions responsible for awareness, memory, and personality are absent.

The person's biological life goes on, but the psychological self thinking & feeling identity may not be present as we understand it. Consequently, the separation of physical life and psychological existence raises deep ethical and emotional problems.

The Family’s Invisible Trauma

While the patient remains unconscious, families experience a unique form of grief known in psychology as “ambiguous loss.” Unlike death, where closure eventually arrives, ambiguous loss keeps families trapped between hope and acceptance.

For more than a decade, Rana’s family lived with the psychological burden of watching a loved one survive only through machines. Such scenarios often result in the devastation of enduring emotional exhaustion, guilt, and the immobility of decision as families find it hard to deal with questions which have no pleasurable answers: Is keeping the patient on treatment a sign of love or just making the suffering last? Dignity is one of the Psychological Needs The court's focus on dignity confirms a key psychological point: humans relate their selfhood most often with freedom and their capacity to act.

If someone's life is only sustained through mechanical means, the lack of freedom might even threaten one's notion of dignity.

In directing the All India Institute of Medical Sciences in New Delhi to begin the process for passive euthanasia, the court recognised that sometimes compassion lies not in prolonging life indefinitely, but in acknowledging its natural limits.

A Society Confronting Mortality

The Rana case forces Indian society to reflect on the psychological meaning of life itself. Medical technology can extend biological survival far beyond what was possible decades ago. But psychology reminds us that a meaningful life is more than a functioning body; it is consciousness, relationships, memory and identity.

The decision does not simply end one man's prolonged medical struggle. It challenges society to confront an uncomfortable question: When life becomes only a medical condition, how do we honour the humanity within it?

Just like a healthy diet supports our body, the right mental diet is also very important for the development of our mind and creativity, stated Yuvraj Malik, director of the National Book Trust, at a 'Mee Lekhak Honarach' workshop held at Savitribai Phule Pune University, on Saturday. He added that the kind of reading, writing, and thinking one does is what actually determines their outlook and creativity, and he therefore invited the budding writers to be selective about the literature they consume.

Organised as a four, day event, the workshop brought together the National Book Trust, Savitribai Phule Pune University, and Samarth Yuva Foundation, with a shared intention of motivating the youth to take up writing as a regular habit and making them aware of the power of writing by understanding its role in making history and changing society. Place- based learning and interactive activities, with listening and speaking techniques, were some of the tools which helped to illustrate that writing is an art, and that one's observing powers and literary knowledge can be used to good effect in national development.

Malik shared a 10+1+1 formula10 pages of reading, 1 page of writing, and 1 minute of speaking daily, an effective method to build a robust literary identity. He pointed out that without facts, statements are just words, so he motivated the students to focus on doing research and writing based on it.

 "The better the content we consume, the better we produce," he remarked, recommending a selection of books for young writers.

ng young authors, and encouraged students to harness their creativity without fear of judgment. "You can transform society through writing. Never crush your creative instincts," he advised.

Vice chancellor Dr Suresh Gosavi praised the Pune Book Festival for fostering a reading culture and highlighted the workshop’s role in preparing new writers. “Such initiatives help students improve their comprehension and research-based writing skills,” he said.

The event also featured the launch of Dr Sadanand Bhosale’s poetry collection 'Main Zinda Hoon', followed by an engaging discussion on literary pursuits.

Indira Gandhi National Open University(IGNOU) has officially started online applications for the entrance exam of its Post Graduate Diploma in Rehabilitation Psychology (PGDRPC) program for the July 2026 academic session. Candidates can apply via Samarth Higher Education Admission Portal. The university has set March 5 as the deadline for submission of applications.

The notification marks the beginning of admissions to one of IGNOU’s specialised psychology programmes at a time when trained rehabilitation professionals remain in short supply across clinical, educational and community settings.

Programme anchored in regulatory framework

The Discipline of Psychology provides the PGDRPC in the School of Social Sciences (SOSS). The diploma has also been designed in a manner that a candidate is equipped with conceptual clarity as well as the applied skills in the field of Rehabilitation Psychology - an area that deals with assessment, therapeutic intervention, and long-term support of individuals with disabilities at various stages of their lives.

According to the sources of the University, the programme is running according to the standards set out in the Rehabilitation Council of India (RCI) Regulations, 2017. Its compliance with the normative rules is the key to its academic organization and professional reputation.

Eligibility criteria according to RCI’s standards

According to the specified criteria, the applicants have to have any of the following qualifications in a UGC-recognised university:

Four years of study, a Bachelor Degree (Regular Mode) in General Psychology as a subject;

The holder must possess a Master Degree in any field of Psychology (distance mode or regular); Master of Degree in Counselling Psychology (distance or regular). Candidates under the General category should have obtained a minimum of 55 per cent aggregate marks in their qualifying examination whereas SC/ST/OBC-NCL candidates should have obtained a minimum of 50 per cent.

The authorities have made it evident that eligibility requirements are going to be taken seriously as per the provisions of RCI, leaving very little to deviation. The entrance exam will be carried out offline.

The entry into it will be based on a competitive entrance test. The test will consist of 50 multiple-choice questions, with all having four marks, which equals 200 marks. The marking will be negative, and one mark will be deducted for each of the incorrect items. Incomplete questions will not receive any penalty.

The examination will be conducted in an offline format in specific centres of the universities in the country. The candidates will be expected to answer the questions in an OMR sheet by following the recommended procedure. The time of the examination has been established as 90 minutes.

The offline format and the structured marking scheme reflect the focus of the University on standardised assessment and transparency in the selection.

Rise in demand for rehabilitation specialists

The announcement comes at a crucial time when there is a growing national emphasis on disability rights, inclusive education, and mental health services. Specialists have continually pointed to the shortage of qualified rehabilitation psychologists, particularly outside major cities.

IGNOU has opened admissions to the July 2026 session, thus putting the university in a position to fill a desperate skills shortage in the sector. Nevertheless, there are a few seats, and the rules that regulate who is eligible are in place; therefore, the competition will be high.

It has been recommended to the applicants to fill out the online registration before the deadline of March 5 because no late submissions will be entertained.

As board examinations begin across the country, mental health professionals are witnessing a sharp rise in stress and anxiety among students. Pune-based child psychiatrist Dr Bhooshan Shukla says the pressure during the board exam season is so intense that it significantly alters clinical patterns.

Q: What should be the role of parents in helping their children's mental health during board exams?

Dr Shukla: A lot of this depends on what relationship they have built up to this point.

If you have a relationship where you are a partner of your child in the studies, then you already have a plan of how the two of you are going to prepare and how the last days before the exams are going to be.

If your job has mainly been of, say, a supervisor, then that is what you continue to do. But by supervisor, I mean that your child has actually listened to you for the last one year. So there is a plan which you supervise, and the child has agreed that you will be their supervisor and they actually let you do that, and that has happened through the year.

The third version, which I believe is true for almost 80% of the families, is where parents’ get involved every now and then and try to motivate their children in some way or the other to study, and the children are largely either ignoring the parents or getting into conflict with them. If this has been your relationship for the past entire year, then right now is the time to actually step back and let the child do their thing.

Because you have tried your thing for an entire year or 2 years and it hasn't exactly gone according to your plans. So at least at this point of time you need to step back.

Q: What should be the role of teachers, schools, and tuition teachers at this time?

Dr Shukla: To tell you very honestly, schools and teachers have been doing the same thing over and over for years. They are unlikely to take advice from a child psychiatrist or any mental health professionals. Their typical stand is that we have been doing this every year, we have turned out champions. We know what we are doing.

Tuition teachers never get alerted. When do the schools get active? When either one of the children kills themselves, or at least says that they are going to end their life. That is when everybody suddenly wakes up and starts looking for a mental health expert.

The thing is that the stress bursting mechanism or the resilience has to be built over a period of time. Constantly giving threatening messages to children and telling them that they are going to go to hell if they don't behave, that doesn't really generate that environment.

So in this last month, I think the simple job the teachers and even parents have is quite similar, is to encourage the children. Say “Yes you can do it. Go ahead, you will be fine”.

Q: What can the students themselves do to keep their mental health safe?

Dr Shukla: It's very contrarian advice to what their teachers and their parents are going to tell them. But I give this advice from two standpoints: one as a mental health doctor and second as someone who has consistently aced these exams.

1. You must sleep for 7 to 8 hours everyday. Sleep is absolutely golden.
2. You have to have 45 minutes to one hour of exercise or play every day, even on the evening before the exam. That's the greatest stress buster you can ever have. You physically sweat it out and you are fine.
3. If you are into some kind of performing art like music, dancing, whatever, you need to do that every day. Something that uses totally different circuits of your brain than what you use for studying.
4. You have to eat less. You don't have to starve yourself but stay off sugars, stay away from chocolate. Have multiple but small meals instead of those big chunky meals twice in the day. That keeps you sharp.
5. Hydration is very important. People forget to drink water. I might sound like a grandmother but it boils down to these small things.

Children's education, which for a long time was seen as a surefire way for one's social mobility, is increasingly turning out to be a source of financial and emotional pressure for many urban households in India. The ever increasing school fees have gone beyond mere numbers on budget sheets, quietly changing the way parents live, plan, and make sacrifices.

This escalating worry found a strong outlet first through Dr Shraddhey Katiyar, a doctor from Noida, whose post on social media platform X has stirred a massive conversation about the real cost of schooling in India. His statement touched the hearts of parents who feel the pressure every day but hardly ever express it publicly.

“School fees don’t just test a parent’s income. They test their silence,” Katiyar wrote, capturing what many families endure year after year. According to him, fee hikes are rarely protested openly; instead, parents absorb the increases quietly—skipping holidays, postponing personal goals, and taking on extra work to keep their children enrolled.

“Every year, the number rises. And parents quietly adjust life around it. Fewer vacations. Delayed dreams. Extra shifts. No complaints. Just quiet sacrifice,” his post read.

Katiyar also questioned the justification schools often provide for repeated fee increases. Despite assurances of “quality education” and improved infrastructure, he pointed out that many classrooms remain overcrowded while teachers continue to be underpaid. “A child’s future should not feel like a monthly threat,” he wrote, arguing that education should not resemble a recurring financial warning.

Warning of the broader consequences, Katiyar said that when schooling begins to feel like a luxury rather than a basic right, it inevitably excludes deserving children. “Education was meant to uplift families, not exhaust them,” he noted, adding that children often grow up realising “their parents paid the price, silently.”

The post struck a chord online, prompting parents across cities to share similar experiences. Many spoke of cutting back on essentials to manage annual fee hikes. One user commented, “Too much unnecessary expense. The quality of teaching is low, and lavish campuses seem to be the priority.” Another wrote, “Most schools feel like factories—making money without delivering meaningful learning.”

Some highlighted the social pressure surrounding fee protests. “Parents remain silent because speaking up damages their reputation,” a user observed. Another one added, "Schools have turned into a cartel, increasing fees every year without any justification."

Now that the debate is heating up, Katiyar's post has once again brought up the unpleasant issues of affordability, accountability, and whether the schooling system in India is moving away from its original promise of equal opportunity."

A new study by a team of researchers from IIT Bombay has revealed that over half of students from Indian universities are living with ‘moderate mental health’, a state in which they are not clinically ill, but are also not thriving.

The team conducted two studies, one with nearly 800 students between the age of 18-25 years from across India to map the landscape of their well-being, and the other, an experiment on a smaller group.

The results of the first study, published early this month in the Journal of Human Values, revealed that only a third of the students were found to be ‘flourishing’, indicating a combination of social, emotional and psychological well-being, while the majority (55%) were simply going through the motions.

IIT study: Engaged living, family support influence mental health

A study on mental health of students in Indian universities by a team of IIT researchers found 12% of the surveyed students were found to be ‘languishing,’ a state devoid of motivation and joy that often is a precursor to more serious mental health disorders.

The team of Prof Ashish Pandey from IIT-B’s Shailesh J Mehta School of Management, his two Ph D scholars Chirag Dagar and Ajinkya Navare, and research assistant Aishwarya surveyed students, 464 male and 316 female, between the age of 18-25 years were part of an online workshop on self-awareness and wellness. A large majority of these participants were from urban and semi-urban locations and belonged to nuclear families.

The study found that self-direction and achievement are the two factors impacting mental health significantly. Higher self-direction led to higher well-being and on the contrary, higher drive for achievement led to an increase in the probability of languishing. Achievement, in this context, is a value that stresses on personal success as per societal standards.

“Our analysis showed that engaged living, social connections and family support strongly influenced mental health. Students who were more engaged, socially connected and supported by their families were more likely to be flourishing rather than merely coping or languishing. Additionally, we observed that a focus on hedonism was associated with poorer mental health outcomes, with such students more likely to be languishing,” said Prof Pandey.

The second study, a field experiment on a smaller group of 107 graduate students enrolled in an MBA programme at a top-rung institute, was done to examine the effect of a curriculum-integrated course comprising contemplative and mind-body practices on the markers of their ‘social connectedness’ and well-being.Seventeen per cent of the participants of the second study were female.

In this study, the researchers embedded a seven week comprehensive development program into the college curriculum which, apart from traditional lectures also, included yoga, mindfulness, and self reflection exercises. The results were highly visible. The students who took the program experienced a significant increase in their social connectedness, which was associated with higher levels of friendliness, compassion, and joy for others, thus resulting in their overall flourishing.

The group emphasized that mental health must not be viewed as a distinct problem apart from academic achievement.

The research showed that it is possible for universities to help the next generation develop the resilience required for a fulfilling life by substituting a culture of ruthless competition with one that promotes self, awareness and community.