Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Sunday called on colleges and universities to impart stress management lessons to students. Her rationale was that this will help in increasing the students' inner strengths.
Sitharaman's comment came in the wake of death of a 26-year-old CA professional employed with Ernst & Young (EY), a Big 4 accounting firm. Anna Sebastian Perayil, the 26-year-old CA, passed her Chartered Accountancy exams in 2023 and worked at the EY Pune office for four months died in July.
In a letter to EY India chairman Rajiv Memani, Perayil's mother attributed her daughter's death to excessive workload, which drained her "physically, emotionally and mentally." While addressing an event at a private medical college, she alluded to the death of the young CA, without naming the victim or the company.
"Was discussing about an issue that is on newspapers for the past two days. Our children go to colleges and universities for education and come out in flying colours. A company, without mentioning its name, its a partnership. There, a woman who had studied CA well, unable to cope with the work pressure, 2-3 days ago, we received a news -- she died unable to cope with the pressure," Sitharaman said.
She added that even if educational institutions impart good education and ensure jobs to students via campus recruitments, they should teach certain things, along with that, which are taught in the family.
"What should families teach -- whatever you study and the job you do, you should have the inner strength to handle that pressure and this can be achieved through divinity only," she said.
"Believe in God, we need to have God's grace. Seek God, learn good discipline. Your Atma shakthi will grow only from this. The inner strength will come only with growing Atma shakti," the Finance Minister said.
FM Sitharaman added that educational institutions should bring in divinity and spirituality, then only will children get the inner strength. The central government stepped into the matter and said that it will investigate the work environment at the Big 4 accounting firm.
Senior Congress leader KC Venugopal attacked Sitharaman, describing her remarks as "outright cruel" and accused the Union Minister of blaming the victim. Venugopal said in a post on X that the ruling regime and Sitharaman can only see the pain of corporate giants like Adani and Ambani.
He also said that the current government is unable to see the pain of hardworking and toiling young generation where freshers like Anna are exploited by the greedy corporate system, if they even succeed in getting a job in this era of historic joblessness.
"It is downright cruel on part of the finance minister to blame Anna and her family for suggesting that she should have learnt stress management at home. This kind of victim blaming is despicable and no words can convey the anger and disgust one feels because of such statements," he said in a post on 'X.'
He also questioned how the government could be so 'heartless' and whether they have lost all sense of compassion.