In a fatal case of corporal punishment, a six-year-old boy studying in a private school in Telangana's Nalgonda district died on Sunday, a day after 'collapsing' in his school. Parents have alleged that the teacher hit the child brutally.
The Class 1 student was reportedly punished by his teacher for failing to speak in English, The Times of India reported.
The teacher allegedly banged the head of the student on the wall leading to internal injuries. The boy, who is from a tribal family, collapsed in the school and was taken to a Hyderabad hospital, where he died on Sunday.
The incident took place in a private school in located in Halia Mandal of Nalgonda, nearly 102 km from Hyderabad. A team of policemen has reportedly been deployed in the area.
The relatives and other protestors reportedly kept the boy's body outside the school gate demanding the arrest of the teacher and the school principal.
"The teacher deserves nothing less than life imprisonment. She hit the boy's head against a wall for not speaking in English. The boy was talking in Telugu, and the teacher got so angry that she beat him up severely," Child Rights Protection Committee president Anuradha Rao told TOI.
However, the police said that the allegation of corporal punishment was only verbal and not mentioned in the lodged complaint.
"It's (corporal punishment) an allegation made verbally. Whether he died of corporal punishment or due to any other health ailment, will be ascertained only after the autopsy. We are waiting for the postmortem report and based on it we will proceed further," an officer told Press Trust of India.
