Kolkata: One of Kolkata's top schools has virtually admitted, say investigating officials, that a 13-year-old student who committed suicide in February at home was caned repeatedly by his principal.
Rouvan Rawla, who attended the prestigious La Martiniere Boys' School, was found hanging at home. The police spoke to his students and teachers in the days after his death to determine what might have prompted the teenager to kill himself. (
Read: Case against top Kolkata school for student's suicide)
Members of the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) say that school officials admit that Rouvan was caned three days before he killed himself. The principal, Sunirmal Chakravathi, had also told Rouvan that he wanted to meet his parents to discuss his indiscipline.
The NCPCR's inquiry is aimed at establishing whether the school played any role in the student's suicide.
Rouvan Rawla's father, Ajay, says the principal admitted not just that he caned Rouvan but that the cane broke during the act.
"I think constant victimisation, abuse, ridicule, humiliation...combined with beating (led to the suicide)...Rouvan was a proactive, happy, energetic, positive kid. To break a kid like that....everyone has elasticity, right...? But at some point of time it snaps," says Ajay Rawla, victim's father.
Rouvan was the youngest of three children.
The student's death angered classmates, school alumni and others, who used a social networking site to condemn corporal punishment in the school and demanded the Principal's removal.
Sunirmal Chakraborty, the Principal, was not available for comment. The school's Board of Governors, headed by the Bishop of Kolkata, did launch an inquiry into Rouvan Rawla's death, but would not disclose what action, if any, had been taken.