They Slut-Shamed Her in a Boys Hostel Corridor. The Committee Told Her She Should Have Reconciled.

Hyderabad- When Savitri, a second-year MA Sociology student at the University of Hyderabad (UoH), stepped into a male batchmate's hostel room past midnight on December 11, 2025, seeking help with a train ticket, she could not have anticipated that this moment would unravel into months of harassment, public humiliation, institutional betrayal, and social isolation that would leave her battling panic attacks and constant anxiety within her own campus.

Savitri, a Keralite girl with an Assamese mom from a Scheduled Tribe background, had until then considered the two male students in question, Arun and Varun , her friends. Close enough, in fact, that she and her family had welcomed them into their home in Kerala for over a month during an internship, covering their accommodation, food, and other expenses. Her father, she would later note with bitterness, has a chronic heart condition. That detail would become relevant in ways she never imagined.

The chain of events that night began simply enough. Savitri was struggling to arrange transportation to the railway station and turned to the two students for help. They agreed, but with a condition that she bring along Babu, a mutual friend. Babu, however, was unwell and declined. When Savitri went to F Hostel to convey this to the two students, two other male batchmates virtual strangers to her, were also present in the room. What followed, she says, shattered something inside her.

Upon hearing that Babu would not be joining, Arun erupted into abusive language, hurling expletives at Babu in front of these strangers and dragging Savitri's personal relationship with him into open ridicule. Varun, meanwhile, adopted what Savitri describes as a deeply patronizing tone, advising her to reconsider her association with Babu based on his refusal to join them that night. Both, she would later understand, had pre-existing personal grievances against Babu, grievances they apparently chose to channel through her. "I felt publicly shamed and emotionally overwhelmed," she would later write in her formal complaint. "So much that I could barely restrain myself from breaking down in front of complete strangers."

The following afternoon, when Savitri confided in Babu about what had happened, he took it upon himself, without informing her, to call Arun and confront him. The call ended in a heated argument, with Arun refusing to take accountability and demanding that whoever had made the claims be brought to him in person. When Babu later called Savitri to corroborate her account, she found herself caught between her friend's anger and her own desire to put the incident behind her. She asked him not to escalate further. He agreed, but also insisted on some form of clarification, and so that evening, Savitri went back to F Hostel.

Then, at 8:35 pm, Varun called her with what she understood to be a veiled threat: that Arun was furious and might physically harm Babu. Alarmed, Babu called two of his own friends — Avinash and Raj (names changed) — to accompany him as a precautionary measure. They waited at the hostel for over an hour for Arun, who had sent a voice message saying he had gone to the South Gate and would return in an hour. He did not return. Eventually, Bablu and his friends left, deciding to address the matter the next day.

What happened in the hours that followed remains one of the most distressing episodes Savitri recounts. Around 12:23 am on December 12, Varun began calling her repeatedly, pressuring her to accompany them when they went to confront Babu. She refused, again and again. The calls did not stop. "He wouldn't stop calling until I had to give in," she says. "He put me in a highly dangerous situation." Varun came to escort her himself, and she found herself being led to H Hostel, where seven men were waiting — an atmosphere she describes as hostile from the moment she arrived.

What began as a confrontation quickly spiralled. Both Arun and Varun were aggressive from the outset, physically intimidating in their proximity and tone. Then the tide turned on Savitri herself. When she recounted the details of the previous night's incident, both students turned on her, accusing her of betrayal, blaming her entirely for the situation despite her repeated attempts to de-escalate. When physical altercation broke out between the two groups, Babu had to flee. But Savitri remained, and what she experienced in those moments and in the corridor of the boys' hostel that night, would define the months that followed.

In the corridor, Arun and Varun openly slut-shamed her. Remarks reportedly made at the scene attempted to publicly define her character in sexually degrading terms: "yeh aise hi ladki hai, sab jaante hai." Varun threatened her in explicit terms: "Yaad rakhna yeh sab tumhare wajah se hua hai, chodhunga nahi mein tujhe, university mein jeena haram kar dunga tumhara." He had to be physically escorted away by Avinash for Savitri's safety. The threats did not end there. Varun warned he would contact her family. The very next day, he made good on that threat, calling her elder sister without Savitri's knowledge or consent.

The call to her sister sent shockwaves through Savitri's personal life. She was confronted by her family. During her entire stay at home during the semester break, she lived under the constant fear that Varun might contact other family members including her father, whose heart condition Varun was fully aware of. "His intent," she would later write, "was to violate my privacy and cause some fatal damage."

Savitri had hoped that returning to the university after the break would offer some relief. Instead, she returned to a campus where narratives had already been constructed against her. Common friends had been told she was vindictive for speaking up. Social exclusion had set in quietly but unmistakably, batchmates avoiding her, a roommate who sided with the accused, and strangers approaching her with accusations based on one-sided accounts they had been fed in her absence. On class group platforms, one of the accused continued to make what she describes as mocking and provocative remarks, fully aware of the sensitivity of the situation.

Multiple committees had been constituted following complaints filed by the accused students themselves with the Proctorial Board and an Anti-ragging Committee under UGC. When Savitri was called to record her statement before the UGC Anti-Ragging Committee in January, she formally registered her own harassment complaint, expecting the process to begin. "I was naive to assume the process would be straightforward," she tells The Mooknayak. "Their response never came." She waited until March. The situation on campus only worsened. She wrote back. There was no reply.

Other committees: an Anti-Discrimination Cell and a Fact-Finding Committee, proved no more supportive. Rather than centering her experience of harassment, intimidation, and public slut-shaming, Savitri says these bodies repeatedly attempted to hold her liable for the incident, for the act of speaking up. One of the committees allegedly attempted to impose a fine of Rs. 5,000 on her for a hostel rule violation, though this was later revoked. More damaging, she says, was the moral policing she encountered even within these institutional spaces. Remarks were allegedly made suggesting that women who visit boys' hostels invite trouble upon themselves , effectively placing the burden of the accused's conduct on Savitri's shoulders.

By late March, with no resolution in sight and the campus climate continuing to deteriorate, Savitri filed a formal complaint with the Gender Sensitisation Committee Against Sexual Harassment (GS-CASH) on March 24. Even here, the doors did not open easily. The committee initially declined to take up the matter, citing that it had "already reached finality at another appropriate forum." Only after persistent effort was the complaint accepted. But the hearings, she says, followed a pattern distressingly familiar by then, committee members appeared to minimise the gravity of the harassment she had faced, suggesting that the accused may have acted "in a moment of anger," a framing she finds deeply troubling.

It was at this point that the All India OBC Students Association (AIOBCSA) extended its support. Savitri credits this solidarity as a turning point in her ability to stay firm. "Kiran anna (Kiran Kumar Gowd) and others motivated me to stay firm with my stand," she says. AIOBCSA has since issued a public statement standing firmly with Savitri, released posters, and is planning a protest on campus. The organisation has drawn pointed attention to what it describes as a pattern of institutional apathy and selective accountability, noting that a woman student who came forward with complaints of harassment was met with suspicion and isolation, while the accused appeared to receive political sympathy and backing from certain campus groups.

AIOBCSA's statement also raises sharp questions about the role of certain campus political organisations, alleging that rather than engaging seriously with the accusations of misogyny, intimidation, and public slut-shaming, some groups worked to divert the narrative and shield the accused from accountability.

"The silence of many self-proclaimed progressive organisations on the abusive remarks, threats, public humiliation, and victim-blaming faced by the survivor exposes a deeply selective approach towards questions of gender justice," the statement reads.

A hearing before the GS-CASH committee had been scheduled for Monday, but has been postponed as Bablu is currently out of town.

Savitri herself, in conversation with The Mooknayak, reflects on the incident with a clarity that has cost her enormously to arrive at. She does not claim to fully understand what triggered the initial outburst. "A possible explanation I can give is that both the boys and Bablu were already having some issues since the past, but I had continued to remain a good friend despite all their personal grudges. That night when he refused to join us and I went to inform them, they saw an opportunity to let out their frustrations."

She is equally clear about what she wants from this process, not revenge, but accountability. A written acknowledgement, she says, would at least protect her going forward. "It would help in filing any future police complaints if they ever try to get back at me."

What Savitri carries today is not the weight of one night in December, but of months of compounded harm, slut-shaming in a hostel corridor, body-shaming that she says Arun had engaged in on multiple prior occasions, a family thrown into turmoil without her consent, a social world on campus that has contracted around her, panic attacks, and an institutional apparatus that asked her, repeatedly, to understand the anger of the men who humiliated her.

"All I want," she says, "is the freedom to breathe again."

The names of the individuals involved have been changed to protect the identity of the complainant. This report is based on the complainant's formal written complaint, her conversation with The Mooknayak, and the public statement issued by AIOBCSA.

The Mooknayak also reached out to the Vice Chancellor and Registrar of the University of Hyderabad seeking their official response on the action taken in this matter and the current status of the pending inquiries. This report will be updated upon receipt of their responses.