Six years after being booked for abetting the suicide of three minor students, the police has given a ‘clean chit’ to four teachers, including the one teaching Sanskrit in a Virar-based school.
The Bombay High Court was recently informed that the police did not find any ‘incriminating’ material against the teachers, except that they had beaten up the students.
A bench of Justices Ranjit More and Surendra Tavade was recently informed that the police has filed its charge sheet in the case, however, nothing much has been found against the teachers, who allegedly thrashed the three students for securing low marks in Sanskrit.
The bench has accordingly ordered the police to file an affidavit spelling out its stand.
The case pertains to the drowning of three class IX students in the Sukh river at Virar, in August 2014. The students were allegedly trying to escape from their residential school – Vagad Gurukul International School, and during the process, they slipped into the river nearby the school wall.
It is alleged by the parents of the trio that the school’s Sanskrit teacher had thrashed the students, along with three other teachers, for getting fewer marks in the subject.
Initially, when the bodies were found, the police arrested the four teachers and the matter was also dealt with by the Maharashtra State Commission for Protection of Child Rights (MSCPCR) for a few years.
However, after completing the probe, the police which had initially invoked provisions of abatement to suicide against the teachers found nothing against them. The cops accordingly revoked the penal sections and allowed their release on bail.
Aggrieved by the same, the parents of one of the students had petitioned the bench led by Justice More seeking a CBI probe in the matter.
“However, we have informed the court that no case of abatement to suicide is being made out, based on which we can prosecute the teachers,” said Prajakta Shinde, public prosecutor, in the case.
“Even the report of Dr Samir Dalvai, the renowned psychiatrist states that the trio jumped into the river because of fear. So only evidence is that the teachers have hit and nothing about abetting the suicide,” Shinde added.
The prosecution claims that the students jumped into the river. “They were not aware of the depth of the river and hence drowned,” Shinde said.
