Former US representative Solomon Oritz once said that “Education is the key to success in life and teachers make a lasting impact in the lives of their students.” Even in Indian society teachers (Guru) are compared with God. But what if your teacher starts to hinder your study of a whole year over a paycheck? That is exactly what happened in a school in Aluva, Ernakulam district of Kerala where two primary school students were punished since they had not paid their school fee.
These two students of the second standard were forbidden from examination and were punished by school teachers since they failed to pay ₹990/- as school fees for the month of March. Both the students had to stand in the sun for nearly three hours. One of the punished student aged about 7 years was suffering from an eye problem as reported by The NewsMinute
One of the mothers of the students told TheNewsMinute that the incident did not come as a surprise since the children had been threatened earlier that they will not be allowed to appear in exams as they had not paid the school fees. But she never assumed that they will do it anyway.
The mother also said that they came to school with panchayat representatives of that area but did not get to meet the principal anyway. But they did get some rude replies from management authorities.
Now, Kerala state human rights commission’s chairman Justice Antony Dominic has taken cognizance of this issue and filed a suo-moto case against the school authorities. By fulfilling his responsibilities he also asked for a report from district collector and deputy director of education within three weeks. This is not the only legal action taken against school authorities, as Aluva west-police have filed a case under Section 75 of juvenile justice act against the principal of the school.