Chandigarh:
Sixteen years after Ruchika Girhotra committed suicide unable to bear the trauma of being molested and expelled from school, the Chandigarh Home Secretary has ordered an inquiry against Sacred Heart school where Ruchika studied. The school has been asked to explain why she was asked to leave.
The action comes following nation-wide outcry against the grave injustice a traumatised teenager had to undergo. As her classmates have narrated how Ruchika became the object of her peers' gossip after the ex-Haryana Director General of Police (DGP) molested her; the school had asked her to go citing flimsy charge that her fees had not been paid on time. Ruchika incidentally had been attending the school for 10 years.
Quick takes:
"Rathore had illegitimately used his influential position to get Ruchika removed from the school. My daughter took admission in that school in nursery class and studied there for 13 years," SC Girhotra told reporters in Chandigarh on Sunday.
"The school authorities did not give us any substantial reason behind her sudden expulsion from the school. They cited some late fees related issue as a reason behind this, which was totally baseless," he added.
Ruchika was studying in Sacred Heart School in Sector 26. Coincidently, Rathore's daughter was Ruchika's classmate in the same school.
Also lashing out at the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), Girhotra said: "Rathore was the only reason behind the suicide of my daughter and I do not know why CBI did not include the abetment to suicide charge against him. Now we will again file a case in the higher court and appeal to include this charge against Rathore."
Lawyer Pankaj Bhardwaj, who has fought the Ruchika case free of cost for the last 13 years, said that there were many loopholes in the CBI's inquiry.
The school still doesn't have a counselor.
The action comes following nation-wide outcry against the grave injustice a traumatised teenager had to undergo. As her classmates have narrated how Ruchika became the object of her peers' gossip after the ex-Haryana Director General of Police (DGP) molested her; the school had asked her to go citing flimsy charge that her fees had not been paid on time. Ruchika incidentally had been attending the school for 10 years.
Quick takes:
- School wasn't coming forth with any reaction
- So Home Secretary ordered enquiry
- Ruchika's friend Aradhana's mother had written to him
- PIL against Rathore asking case to be reopened (Read: PIL to be filed against Ruchika's school)
- School ordered to give their side of the story
- She had become the talk of the school then she was expelled, added to her depression
"Rathore had illegitimately used his influential position to get Ruchika removed from the school. My daughter took admission in that school in nursery class and studied there for 13 years," SC Girhotra told reporters in Chandigarh on Sunday.
"The school authorities did not give us any substantial reason behind her sudden expulsion from the school. They cited some late fees related issue as a reason behind this, which was totally baseless," he added.
Ruchika was studying in Sacred Heart School in Sector 26. Coincidently, Rathore's daughter was Ruchika's classmate in the same school.
Also lashing out at the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), Girhotra said: "Rathore was the only reason behind the suicide of my daughter and I do not know why CBI did not include the abetment to suicide charge against him. Now we will again file a case in the higher court and appeal to include this charge against Rathore."
Lawyer Pankaj Bhardwaj, who has fought the Ruchika case free of cost for the last 13 years, said that there were many loopholes in the CBI's inquiry.
The school still doesn't have a counselor.
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