The head teacher of a government primary school in Dehradun was suspended after the education department took cognizance of a video showing students being made to perform manual labour. The purported video showed eight students lifting gravel with shovels and pans at the Government Primary School, Banjarawala, in the Raipur block Monday. Some uniformed children enrolled at the school are seen carrying sand and soil on their heads, while others use spades and shovels to pile it into pans. The district education department has confirmed that the children were made to work and has suspended the head teacher in charge, Anju Manaduli. Manaduli, who had been working in the school since 2009, had taken over the charge in July. Manaduli has been working at the school since 2009. Bharti said that an enquiry has been ordered and all five teachers of the school have been served with show cause notices. The incident took place Monday during the school’s lunch break. The suspension letter stated that “students were being made to perform manual labour”. “This reflects the negligence and indiscipline of the school’s head teacher. Based on information and videos received from social media and various sources, it has been confirmed that students were given spades, shovels, and pans to lift sand and gravel. This is a violation of the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, 2009, and Uttarakhand Government, Department of Women Empowerment and section 13 of the Child Development Notification of 2011,” the letter further said. The DEO has also directed that an investigation officer from the department be appointed to inquire into the matter. The investigation officer has been tasked to hear the party concerned, conduct a fair and impartial inquiry, provide the Assistant Teacher with a charge sheet, complete the departmental action, and submit the investigation report within 30 days. The secretary, higher education, Ravinath Raman, said that he has called for an inquiry and report from the Chief Education Officer, Dehradun. The school, according to the Unified District Information System for Education, has 309 students and was established in 1949. Meanwhile, Manaduli claimed that she was unaware of the incident, and the students took it upon themselves to perform the task. “We were building a rainwater harvesting tank, and the gravel and the labour equipment had been left behind by the labourers. The children asked me if the gravel could be deposited over the slushy areas of the ground where rainwater had accumulated. I told them that we had to wait till the labourers came, but they went ahead with the task without informing anyone. By the time I found out, I was served the suspension letter,” she said. Manaduli said that the students hail from a slum cluster near the ISBT.
