A student studying in Class 6 at Navoday school in Thandla, Jhabua district, was allegedly slapped 168 times over a period of six days by her classmates as punishment for not finishing her homework. Fellow classmates slapped the girl at the behest of their teacher.
Initially, the girl didn’t tell anybody about her ordeal but the matter came to light on Wednesday evening. The girl’s father lodged a complaint against the accused teacher Manoj Verma.
The police then recorded the complaint from the student who stated that she could not complete her homework for she had taken leave from class due to an illness.
“This made the teacher angry, and he instructed my 14 classmates to slap me twice every day until the assignment was finished,” it said. The girl took six days — from January 11 to 16 — to finish her homework, however, her fellow classmates had already slapped her 168 times by then.
Upon the father’s confrontation, Verma allegedly said to him that he did not beat the girl personally since the Right to Education Act prohibits him from doing so. However, the law doesn’t specifically disallow using other children to mete out such punishment,
When confronted by the father, Verma allegedly told him that he did not beat the girl personally because the Right to Education Act forbids him from doing so. The law, however, does not specifically disallow using other children to perform such punishment, he claimed.
Shiv Sagar, the school principal, has also allegedly admitted in front of the father that Verma asked the girl’s classmates to slap her. But he chose to brush it off as “friendly punishment, where the classmates did not hit her hard, so she could perform better in the future”.
Shersingh Baghel, the Thandla police inspector, said the student is now sent for a medical examination.
While Collector Ashish Saxena said he had been appraised about the incident too. “I shall wait for the police to conclude their probe before taking appropriate action,” he added.