Opinion Failing the test
The Dehradun school whose staff allegedly tried to cover up a gangrape acted against the law and their duty to students
Sexual violence against children can be discouraged only if punishment is certain.
Five members of the administration and staff of a boarding school in Dehradun have been arrested for trying to conceal the gangrape of a 16-year-old in their care. And had the victim’s sister not alerted her family, the matter may not have come to light at all. In the time-honoured tradition, they sought to pin blame on the victim, rather than the alleged perpetrators, the four boys, fellow students, who have since been remanded.
They convinced the girl that she would bring the institution a bad name, and that disgrace would pull down sister institutions run by the same management. Indeed, instead of counselling the child and calling upon the state to extend its support, they threatened to expel the child if news of the scandal came out. And when it was clear that she was pregnant, they experimented with home remedies — one wonders if such ignorant people can be relied upon to teach — before giving up and taking her to a clinic. Where, it appears, the school’s administrative officer and his wife posed as her parents.
This is a slightly polished version of the behaviour seen in the Muzaffarpur shelter home scandal a month ago, where the staffers had unleashed a reign of sexual terror on the inmates. Certainly, the officials in Dehradun only sought to cover up a crime, and not to perpetrate one themselves. But they made themselves accomplices by their choice, and betrayed the very same disregard for the law, and for their duty to the children in their care, that was seen in Muzaffarpur. While the girls in Muzaffarpur were completely in the power of the people who ran their shelter home, the administrators and staffers in Dehradun tried to reduce the victim to that same condition, using guilt and threats. They almost succeeded, despite the differential in empowerment between the victims in Dehradun and Muzaffarpur. Even after the police and welfare workers rescued the victim, she did not initially cooperate for fear of losing a year of school.
Sexual violence against children can be discouraged only if punishment is certain. This would be impossible if the authorities did not immediately call out such crimes. In Muzaffarpur, an audit by the Tata Institute of Social Sciences exposed the scandal. But the school authorities in Dehradun should have had the wisdom to report their scandal themselves. Now, they are paying the price for following their worst instincts.
Share
