Yadgir: Class 9 student gives birth in school toilet; 28-year-old booked for assault
Yadgir (PTI): A 17-year-old class 9 student of a government-run residential school gave birth to a baby boy in the school’s toilet, police said on Friday.
The incident occurred at around 2 pm on August 27 at a school in Shahapur taluk of the district.
The matter came to light after the girl’s classmates, who reportedly saw her in labour, alerted the school administration, police said.
According to the FIR, the girl—aged 17 years and seven months—was full-term pregnant and had been "sexually assaulted" by an unidentified person about nine months ago.
Initially, the girl, said to be under "immense stress," refused to reveal details of the incident or the person involved. She only told authorities that she developed stomach pain while in the washroom and delivered the baby there.
Both the girl and the child were rushed to the hospital and are reported to be stable.
During the investigation, police identified the accused as a 28-year-old man. A senior officer said the girl will be counselled once she recovers and is declared fit by doctors, to ascertain what happened and whether she knew the accused.
Police also noted that the incident was not immediately reported by the school administration or even by the victim’s brother, who was informed soon after the delivery.
Based on a complaint by the District Child Protection Officer, a case was registered under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act and relevant sections of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita against the accused.
Cases were also booked against four others—including the hostel warden, school principal, staff nurse and the victim’s brother—for failing to inform authorities about the girl’s pregnancy.
The girl had reportedly been irregular in school since the beginning of the academic year, police further said.
Meanwhile, the Karnataka Residential Educational Institutions Society (KREIS) suspended four employees of the school, including the principal and hostel warden, for alleged dereliction of duty and negligence in monitoring the students’ educational and health conditions.
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Student found dead in hostel room in IIT Kharagpur
Kolkata (PTI): A 22-year-old M Tech student was found dead in his hostel room in the Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur, the second such incident reported on the campus within a span of 10 days.
The student, identified as Soham Haldar, was found hanging from the ceiling of his hostel room on Tuesday and he was immediately taken to the institute hospital, where doctors declared him brought dead, an IIT Kharagpur official said.
Haldar, a dual-degree student in Electronics and Electrical Communication Engineering, was a boarder of the Pandit Madan Mohan Malaviya Hall of Residence on the campus.
Police from the Kharagpur Town police station have initiated a probe into the incident as preliminary findings indicated that it could be a case of suicide, though the exact cause of death will be ascertained following the post-mortem examination, the official said.
In a statement, the institute expressed deep grief over the student's death and said a detailed inquiry has been initiated.
The authorities have informed the family and are extending all possible assistance to them, it added.
Director Suman Chakraborty told PTI that the institute will strengthen the mechanism to identify stressed-out and depressed students and take follow-up steps to address their issues.
The grief-stricken parents of the student, who hailed from Barasat in North 24 Parganas district, have come to the campus and the authorities will speak to them, he said.
"Haldar's friends, faculty and staffers also could not gauge any stress or anxiety in him. But we need to enable students suffering from anxiety and extreme stress to open up their minds and do everything needed to prevent such incidents," he said.
Investigators are also scrutinising CCTV footage from the hostel premises to piece together the sequence of events leading to the incident.
The incident comes close on the heels of another student's death reported on April 18, when 21-year-old Jaibir Singh Dodia, a third-year Mechanical Engineering student from Ahmedabad, allegedly died after jumping from the eighth floor of the Atal Bihari Vajpayee Hall of Residence. That case is also under investigation.
The back-to-back incidents have once again brought the issue of mental health and student support systems at the institute into focus, especially in view of several such cases reported last year.
