Thrashed child to get teacher’s salary

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, February 17

In a first, a schoolteacher has been asked to give her month’s salary as compensation to a student, a victim of corporal punishment (established in a report of the Chandigarh Commission for Protection of Child Rights (CCPCR).

After a hearing on a corporal punishment complaint filed by the parents of a child today, the CCPCR directed Adarsh Public School, Sector 20, to take disciplinary action against a teacher under provisions of the RTE Act while exercising power under Sub-Section 3 of Section 15 of the Act. 

Two members of the CCPCR, Parmod Sharma and Prof Nistha Jaswal, recommended that as interim relief, a month’s salary of the teacher be given to the victim as compensation. The commission directed the school to send an action-taken report along with a photocopy of the cheque given to the child’s parents. The Principal of the school was directed to sensitise the teacher as well as the children of the school to corporal punishment.

According to the complaint, on January 30, the result of a written test of computer was declared and the child got seven out of 10 marks, the highest in the class. Despite this, the victim was beaten up and hit on the hands with an iron scale due to which the child remained mum for six hours after returning home. 

After the parents made a complaint to the Principal, the teacher admitted that she had beaten up the child thinking that the child had got zero marks in the computer test. Taking suo motu cognisance of the incident, the CCPCR summoned the Principal and the teacher of the school on February 3. 

During the hearing, the teacher admitted that earlier also she had slapped the child. She apologised and gave an assurance that she would not repeat the mistake.