Principal, Amit Shah and Aamir Khan walk into the classroom

The educational institutions, faced with restrictions in the COVID-19 era, made improvisations and changed their teaching techniques, and so did the notorious students who devised new ways of mischief during the online classes. But, some outsiders are also believed to be infiltrating the sessions, with usernames of famous actors and politicians, or pretending to be the principal.

Though indiscipline is not new to the world of education, but the novel ways adopted by the miscreants, who sneak into the online sessions and cause disruptions, has prompted the teachers in the city colleges to learn new digital techniques to teach netiquettes in the new version of the classrooms.

Screenshots of some of the messages sent by notorious users

One such incident happened at Chetana Junior College in Bandra, where a few days ago the students and the professor received a notification that the 'Principal' had joined, creating chaos briefly. "One random person joined a class as 'Principal' and started giving instructions. Moments later, the user messaged a few students, asking to pay fees. The students got suspicious, and asked a few questions from the user, who fumbled and left the class," said Chetana Junior College Vice Principal Girish Salve.

They're untraceable
The college sought the technology service provider's help to trace the miscreant, but couldn't as the class link was shared on several groups.

Girish Salve, vice principal, Chetana College, Bandra

"Use of technology for online classes is a new experience for teachers too. We are also learning and getting smarter with experience. In an online class, the teacher may not be able to track all the users while teaching. But several students are helping by pointing out the miscreants. Teachers have also been trained to remove any suspected users, who can re-enter only after their approval," said Salve.

He added that a strict rule has been made on the circulation of the class link, and only registered students are allowed to join online classes.

Teachers are being trained to remove any suspected users, who can re-join the online sessions only after their approval. Representation pic

Use names of famous people
In a college in the eastern suburbs, students and the teacher were surprised by the movie dialogues that suddenly appeared on the shared-screen. "Initially, it was difficult to trace the user behind the mischief as it was happening fast, and there was a group of users with random names. They were, however, removed soon. We learnt later that they were not our students. They had got the class link from public groups," said a professor on condition of anonymity.

"Due to internet bandwidth limitations for some students, we let them switch off the webcam. You can then see only their profile picture and usernames. Sometimes, miscreants use names and pictures of famous people, like Aamir Khan and Amit Shah, and sneak into the classes. When we start enquiring and tracing the person, they leave abruptly and it becomes difficult to trace, as the email address or phone numbers of most of them are not registered with us," shared another professor. Some others also logged as PM Narendra Modi, Vikas Dubey -- the history-sheeter who died in an encounter, and Ramu Kaka of Sholay. Some had even started conversations on the construction of Ram Mandir in Ayodhya.

Dr Rajpal Hande, Mithibai College principal

Need to learn techniques
"This type of online teaching-learning culture has just started, and we hope our students and teachers would adapt soon. Because, this will continue during the pandemic," said Dr Rajpal Hande, Mithibai College principal. To ensure discipline at the Vile Parle college, every student needs the professor's approval to join the class.

Similarly at Jai Hind College, the administration has started registering IDs students would use to join the classes, said Dr Ashok Wadia, principal.

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