I spent my adolescence in an all-boys catholic school in a small town in India, and then my IIT years in a boys hostel. Sexist jokes, casual rape references, etc., are quite common in the boys hostels of "the best university in India".
One incident that I can’t forget happened early in my second year. I'm not sure if this is sexual assault because I have never spoken to anyone about this.
First years in IITs are protected (ish) from ragging by the administration. But in the second year, it is time to shift to a "senior wing" of the hostel, where it's an annual ritual to humiliate the incoming sophomores as an "introduction" to their seniors.
Some six of us were lined up by 20 odd seniors, grilled on intimate questions like – "Have you ever had sex?", "How many times a day do you masturbate?", "Which batchmate would you like to fuck?"
When they got bored, they proceeded to assign "tasks".
I had to simulate a blowjob on my roommate. When I tried protesting, I was handed a recently emptied can of coca cola and asked to pretend that was a penis.
I did that, with the can supported against my roommate's actual genital region, to raucous cheers from the crowd.
My roommate and I shared a room for another 2 years, but never really had a normal conversation since; by the third year, we barely spoke.
(Souradip Sen graduated from IIT Bombay in 2014 and runs his own startup called Debate India.)
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