School can't throw child out of classroom: Court

The director and principal of a school were awarded a two-month jail term today by a Delhi court which convicted them for causing mental trauma to a seven-year-old student by sending her out of her classroom.

The court said a child could not be thrown out of a class on the "whims and fancies" of the school authorities as the trauma of not being allowed to sit in a classroom was "immense".

The court also directed OPG World School's director Kavita Chandra and principal Rajwant Kaur to pay Rs 2.5 lakh compensation each to the child, who was asked to leave her class following differences between her parents and the school authorities over an issue. 

Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Ankur Jain held them guilty of wilfully neglecting the child who was in Class 3 at the time of the incident in 2012 and causing her mental



suffering under the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection) Act.

It, however, allowed the plea of the convicts to suspend their sentence for a month and granted them bail to enable them to file an appeal against the judgement before a superior court. The offence entails a maximum of six months in jail under the old law which, after amendment, has been increased to three years.

The court refused to accept the version of the school authorities that the child's parents had asked for a transfer certificate (TC) and instead of collecting it, had sent the girl to school.

"The child cannot be thrown out at the whims and fancies of the school authorities. The theory of the child being not well also cannot be believed as the attendant/nurse from the infirmary was never examined to prove the factum of the child not being well," the court said.