Punjab Law College Shooting: It’s Time To Question Bollywood’s Idea Of Relentless Love And Teach Boys That ‘No’ Means No
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The Punjab law college shooting forces a difficult question: why are boys still not taught that no means no?
Punjab Law College Shooting: It’s Time To Question Bollywood’s Idea Of Relentless Love And Teach Boys That ‘No’ Means No. (AI-generated)
The Monday morning at Mai Bhago Law College in Punjab began as most colleges begin their days. At 9:16 AM, a CCTV camera shows you a scene mirrored in thousands of classrooms across India, with students shuffling into benches and unpacking their weekends to friends. Sandeep Kaur, a first-semester law student, sat in the back row, chatting comfortably with a friend. Within sixty seconds, the unimaginable happened. Prince Raj, a classmate who had spent months stalking her, approached her bench, exchanged a few brief words, and then reached into his bag. He pulled out a gun, and shot her point-blank. He then took a single step aside to turn the weapon on himself.
In less than two minutes, a space dedicated to the study of justice became a witness to its ultimate violation, leaving one student dead and a classroom of witnesses scarred by the lethal intersection of obsession and entitlement. The CCTV footage is 90 seconds of horror, but the story began months ago. It began with a “No.”
In the eyes of Sandeep Kaur, that “No” was a boundary. In the eyes of Prince Raj, and the culture that raised him, it was a provocation. As we dissect the tragedy in Tarn Taran, it becomes clear that we are facing a dual crisis: a narrative that romanticises stalking and an education system that forgets to teach boys how to lose.
The Bollywood Blueprint: ‘Uski Na Mein Hi Haan Hai’
In the week leading up to the shooting, the world was awash in “Valentine Week” tropes. From silver screens to social media reels, the message to young men is often: She said no, but she means ‘keep trying.’ Pop culture has long sold the “Manic Pixie Proposer”; the man who shows up at a woman’s house, follows her to college, and uses grand gestures to wear down her defenses.
When Prince Raj showed up at Sandeep’s house twice to pressure her, he wasn’t acting in a vacuum; he was following a script where relentless pursuit is framed as “true love.” For Sandeep, this “passion” felt like a threat. Her mother recounts months of harassment, yet the shooter likely saw himself as the protagonist of a tragic romance right up until he pulled the trigger.
The Consent Gap: We Teach Girls To Hide, Not Boys To Respect
Our current conversation around consent is lopsided. We teach young women how to dress, how to travel in groups, how to “politely” decline to avoid “triggering” a man. We treat female safety as a series of defensive maneuvers.
What we fail to do is address male entitlement. The law college shooting highlights a lethal lack of emotional intelligence. Prince Raj did not have the tools to process rejection. To him, Sandeep’s autonomy was an insult to his masculinity. According to reports, he had proposed marriage 2-3 times, but she had said no and was already engaged to someone else.
In many circles, a man being rejected is seen as “losing face.”
The transition from a rejected proposal on February 8th to a murder on Monday shows how quickly fragile egos can turn to violence when they have access to weaponry. Whether it was his father’s service weapon or an illegal firearm, the gun was the tool used to “reclaim” the power he felt he lost when she said no.
We must stop framing these incidents as “crimes of passion.” Passion is not a bullet to the temple. This was a crime of control. Until we dismantle the myth that “try, try again” applies to human beings, and until we teach boys that a woman’s “No” is a full sentence, not a negotiation, classrooms will continue to be crime scenes. Sandeep Kaur was there to study the law; she ended up a victim of a lawless cultural entitlement that we are all responsible for dismantling.
February 11, 2026, 12:03 IST
