By Siddhant Mohan, TwoCircles.net
In a tragic turn of events, a Muslim girl named Zaibunnisa committed suicide on January 25 after allegedly facing violence and harassment from her teacher for not performing well during Republic Day parade rehearsals.
Zaibunnisa Safreena, the 14-year-old daughter of Mohammad Ibrahim and Zubaida, was a student of Class Eight in Navodaya Minority Residential School at KR Pet in Mandya district of Karnataka. She called her mother around 4.30 pm on January 25 and asked her to get her out of the school.
During the call made by Zaibunnisa using her friend’s phone, she also complained about one abusive teacher identified as Ravi and told her mother that she did not want to study in that school anymore.
About an hour after she hung up, her friends noticed her body hanging from the ceiling. School administration soon rushed to the room and took the body down. Zaibunnisa was taken to a local hospital, where doctors declared her brought dead.
In the preliminary investigation conducted by KR Pet police, the teachers including Ravi informed police that Zaibunnisa committed suicide. But Zaibunnisa’s parents insist that she was murdered by the accused teacher.
Moreover, when police conducted an inquiry with the hostel-mates and classmates of the Zaibunnisa, many admitted the fact that Ravi had been constantly harassing Zaibunnisa over various issues, and she was indeed disturbed by this. On January 25, Ravi allegedly assaulted Zaibunnisa with a rod in front of many students for not performing well during rehearsals.
Zaibunnisa’s mother told local media that on her last call, Zaibunnisa informed her mother that Ravi even threatened her to strip and thrash her. Zubaida tried to console her daughter by confirming her that she would go to the school next week and talk with school authority over this issue.
Soon after the Zaibunnisa’s parents reached the hospital’s Mortuary, various personnel including relatives of Zaibunnisa and members of Social Democratic Party of India (SDPI) staged a protest outside mortuary demanding justice and immediate arrest of the accused teacher Ravi. Police arrested Ravi later on the charge of abetment to suicide.
G Radhika, the Superintendent of Police at Mandya, told TwoCircles.net, “Ravi has been sent to judicial custody and police is still investigating the case.” Soon after the incident was reported, the school was closed till Sunday. “As the school is opening again on January 29, the police will resume questioning and collecting evidence to reach a conclusion,” she added.
Kripa Alva, the chairperson at Karnataka State Commission for Protection of Child Rights, has said on Sunday that officials of the education department, teachers of the residential school and the staff would be summoned before the commission and a detailed inquiry would be conducted within a week.
“My aim is to put in honest efforts towards providing justice to the aggrieved family,” she told media on Sunday.