In a shameful incident in Dumka, Jharkhand, tribal students of a government-run scheduled tribe residential school on Monday beat up their Maths teacher and a clerk, after tying them to a tree, for giving them poor marks in Class 9 practical examination.
The students then uploaded the video on social media forcing local authorities to sit up and take notice. Eleven out of 32 students in the class got Grade DD (double D), which is considered equivalent to failing. The results were declared on Saturday by Jharkhand Academic Council(JAC).
The beating up of the school teacher, Kumar Suman, was recorded on mobile phones and shown live on social media. The students did not give any hint of their plan to the teacher. They first requested the teacher and clerk to come to them and explain how to improve their performance. The clerk had refused to disclose the marks to the students.
As soon as the teacher and the clerk reached the spot, the students tied them to a tree and started beating them with lathis. While beating both, the students openly said they would post the video live on social media. The injured teacher is now undergoing treatment in the hospital.
Narrating his ordeal to India TV, the teacher said he had no inkling that his students would behave like this. Kumar Suman said, he had no hand in giving marks for the practical exam. The matter is now being investigated by the local education department. Three officers of the department visited the school, spoke to the headmaster and other teachers, and during a search carried out in the residential school, several cell phones were seized. The use of cell phones in school is banned.
The block education officer of Gopikandar, Surendra Hembram alleged that Kumar Suman had in the past used casteist slurs against some students and a case has already been registered against him under SC-ST Act.
Anant Jha, the block development officer of Gopikandar, said a majority of the nearly 200 students of the residential school took part in beating up the teacher and the clerk. The teacher was earlier the Headmaster, but was later removed for reasons not known, Jha said. The new headmaster is Ramdev Keshari. Jha hinted that it could be a case of rivalry between teachers.
Both Classes 9 and 10 have been suspended and all the students have been sent back to their villages. Some of the students alleged that the teacher gave them low marks, and the clerk Soneram Chure uploaded them on the JAC website.
The BDO said, that the present school headmaster failed to show the marks for Maths practical exam and the date on which these marks were uploaded online. He added, prima facie it seems the students thrashed the teacher and clerk on the basis of rumor.
Local police station in-charge Nityanand Bhokta said, that he had requested the school management to lodge a complaint, but it declined saying that it could spoil the career of the students. No FIR was lodged, nor a complaint was lodged by the school management, police said.
Tying up a teacher at a tree and then beating him up with lathis, is a shameful example of the depth to which the education system in rural areas has descended to. The main characters in this drama have behaved in a sordid manner.
Shame on those students who beat up their teacher with lathis and insulted him. Shame on those teachers, who, because of personal rivalry, got one of them beaten up by misguiding students. Such an incident also indicates how smartphones are being misused in social media, to insult a person and blackmail him. There was no discipline in school, nor respect was shown by students to the teachers, nor were they afraid of the police.
This trend is truly worrying. Our society should ponder about the debasement of our culture, where students beat up their teachers and post the videos on social media. This incident requires serious introspection.
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