Bhopal: Dr. Harisingh Gour Central University, Sagar girls hostel caretaker was suspended on Monday for stripping girls to check if they were menstruating. The caretaker Indu Parcha of Rani Laxmi Bai girls’ hostel of the university body checked around 40 students after a sanitary napkin was found discarded carelessly near the toilet on Sunday.
The incident sparked protests by students and on Monday the varsity administration suspended the caretaker Parcha. She is not a permanent employee of the college. No action has been initiated against the hostel warden Chanda Ben.The VC RP Tiwari has constituted a five-member committee to probe the incident and it would submit its report in three days.
The VC told Free Press that there were two versions of the incident as some of the inmates complained that the hostel warden Chanda Ben directed the care taker to strip-search the students, however, a group of girls said that Parcha herself did it and no orders were given to her. The incident, which has sparked protests by students, occurred on Sunday when the warden, Professor Chanda Ben, was undertaking an inspection, the hostel inmates said.
The students said that the warden, angry at the napkin not being properly disposed of, asked the hostel’s caretaker to check the private parts of students to find if they were menstruating after no one owned up.The Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad and other unions staged a protest on Monday with ABVP leader Jyotish Pandey asking authorities to keep the warden away from work till the probe was completed.
The leader of Congress’ student wing National Students Union of India (NSUI), Rahul Khare, submitted a memorandum to the university administration demanding that retired judges and other eminent persons be appointed to the probe committee instead of university teachers.Sagar Lok Sabha MP Laxminarayan Yadav called the alleged action of the warden as “shameful”, but added that it was a “small incident” and the media should not get “agitated” over it.
