Chennai. Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman called upon colleges and universities to teach stress management lessons, which will help students become internally strong. She made this comment in the context of the death of a young chartered accountant (CA) working in EY. Opposition party Congress has criticized Sitharaman’s remarks, calling them “absolutely cruel”.
Anna Sebastian Perayil, who worked for about four months at EY’s Pune office after passing the CA exam in 2023, died in July. Anna’s mother had written a letter to EY India chairman Rajiv Memani saying that as a new employee, Anna was burdened with excessive work, which affected her “physically, emotionally and mentally”.
The government intervened in the matter and said that it would investigate the working environment at the well-known accounting firm EY. Addressing a program at a private medical college here on Saturday, Sitharaman mentioned the 26-year-old female employee. However, she did not name the employee and her employer company.
Sitharaman said, “…I was discussing an issue which has been in the headlines for the last two days. Our children go to college or university for education and come out of there as bright stars. A young woman studying CA was unable to bear the pressure of work in a company. Two-three days ago we got the news that she died due to being unable to bear the pressure.” She said that educational institutions and families should teach children the tricks of stress management, they should tell them that whatever studies you do, whatever job you do, you should have the inner strength to bear the stress related to it. Congress organization general secretary KC Venugopal targeted Sitharaman over this comment.
He said, “The ruling party and the Finance Minister can only see the pain of corporate giants like Adani and Ambani, not of the hardworking young generation. In this era of historic unemployment, even if talented youth like Anna manage to get a job, they are exploited by greedy corporate companies.” Venugopal said in a post on ‘X’, “It is extremely cruel for the Finance Minister to blame Anna and his family by suggesting that Anna should have been taught stress management techniques at home. This kind of victim blaming is disgusting and the anger and disgust that such statements cause cannot be described in words.”