Students and parents staged a protest on Saturday against the ‘illegal detention’ of students and ‘torturing a man’ in front of his daughter by the administration of private school in the Scheme 33 area of the city on Thursday.
The affected parents demanded registration of a first information report (FIR) against the school administration, revocation of school’s licence and arrest of school staff involved in the ‘violence’.
Sachal police have registered a case against the school administration for punishing a girl and torturing her father for non-payment of fees. Sachal Police Station SHO Inspector Aurangzeb Khattak said that the police have registered a case and handed it over to the investigation police.
The protest was organised by the Students-Parents Federation of Pakistan against the alleged illegal detention of students in a private school by the school administration and violence against a man in front of his daughter. The chairman of the Federation, Nadeem Mirza, affected student Maham Zehra, her father Athar Hussain and her mother were among the protestors.
Maham’s father said: “I went to the school after my daughter told me that she was punished by making her stand all day for non-payment of tuition fee. I was beaten in the accounts department and kicked out of school, when I told the school staff their act of punishing a girl student like this was unjust.”
Read Police constable ‘abducted, tortured to death’
The affected student Maham Zehra said: “I was kept standing in the school all day. The teacher said that you have not paid the fee. I told my dad so he went to ask madam. He was sent to the accounts department where he was insulted and tortured. I also got hurt.”
Meanwhile, Leader of the Opposition in Sindh Assembly Haleem Adil Sheikh also joined the protest to show solidarity with the parents. He said: “School’s licence has been suspended today and will be issued in someone else’s name.” Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf stands with victims of the private schools.
DPI action
The Sindh Education Department issued orders to the Directorate of Private Institutions (DPI) to investigate the incident, officials said adding that a DPI team was investigating the incident and action will be taken on its report. The team assigned to probe the matter on Friday was expected to submit report in the next three working days.
According to the education department officials, the DPI team had visited the school and sought details of the matter from the school administration, but they refused to share CCTV footage. Officials confirmed that there were numerous complaints against the said school for keeping children in detention.
Published in The Express Tribune, September 19th, 2021.
COMMENTS
Comments are moderated and generally will be posted if they are on-topic and not abusive.
For more information, please see our Comments FAQ