German professor refuses internship to Indian student citing ‘rape problem’, backtracks

NEW DELHI: A potential controversy was averted on Monday, thanks to some swift action by the German Embassy. Within hours of an Indian student accusing a professor at a university in Germany of rejecting his internship citing India’s “rape problem” as the reason, Michael Steiner, Germany’s ambassador to India sent an urgent mail to the professor stating objection to the her action. The professor was quick to render an apology that was uploaded on the Embassy’s website here.

The matter came to light after a colleague of the Indian student posted emails exchanged between Annette G Beck-Sickinger, professor of biochemistry at Leipzig University, one of the oldest in Germany, and the student on website Quora. An email from the professor stated: “Unfortunately I don’t accept any Indian male students for internships.

We hear a lot about the rape problem in India which I cannot support. I have many female students in my group, so I think this attitude is something I cannot support.” In her reply to ET, Beck-Sickinger said the mail was a misunderstanding and was result of an unpleasant discussions with one of the two Indian students in her lab. “I have nothing against male Indians and I have accepted several Indian students in the past.

However my lab is full and I cannot take any additional student in summer.” She added that rape was a severe problem in many societies and we have to work for equal diversity of male and female, independent of the society.

In a letter to Beck-Sickinger, Steiner said, “In India, the Nirbhaya case has triggered a honest, sustained and very healthy public debate - a debate of a quality that wouldn’t be possible in many other countries.”