My son's leg was slashed in school: Surfer

New Delhi: It would seem that the recent ragging incident at the prestigious Lawrence School is not an isolated incident. After reading about last week's brutal ragging at the Himachal school, an NDTV.com surfer wrote in saying he had to withdraw his son from the school because of bullying just last year.

The surfer Manek Shergill points out that despite belonging to an "influential family", they could "do nothing".

Speaking to NDTV.com, Shergill recounted how senior students attacked his son Jashan, a student of class IX with a knife seniors last year and the school administration didn't do much to punish the guilty.  

Jashan, he said, was a bright kid who loved his school and had a lot of friends there. But one day, one of his seniors caught hold of him and started bullying him. In an extreme moment, the senior student took a razor and inflicted a long, deep gash in Jashan's leg.

Crying in pain, Jashan returned home. His mother saw the wound and asked about it. But the child was too scared to reveal anything and said that a nail had got stuck in his leg. It was only a few days later that he disclosed the truth. Jashan also asked his parents not to take up the matter while he was in school as it could make things even more difficult for him.

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"It was a harrowing experience for us. I could never believe that such a gruesome incident would occur in a prestigious school like Lawrence. There was a deep scar in my son's leg and he was bleeding profusely. At first he didn't say anything, but later when he told us about the incident, we took up the matter with the school's governing body. But they did nothing. All they cared about was their reputation. Today, it was my son's leg, tomorrow it could have been his throat!" said Shergill.

Shergill added that one of the teachers tried to help them initially, but as they went ahead with their fight against the school's inaction, no one cared to listen to their plight. And little Jashan was too scared to go to school after the incident.

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"Society is progressing. And here you have a school like this where such gruesome incidents happen. And nobody is bothered about it. My son faced such problems in Lawrence, but the school remained in denial mode. Ours is an influential family, but we didn't manage anything. All we managed was to take our son out of school. He was denied justice," said Shergill.

Describing the incident as "shameful", Shergill said the school did not take any action against the guilty because they belonged to "well-connected" families. "I have been in a boarding school myself, but I never faced any such incident," he added.

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When NDTV.com contacted the Headmaster of Lawrence School, Praveen Vashisht for his comments, he said he did not agree with Jashan's father, though he did admit he faintly remembered the incident.

"I do not agree with what Mr Shergill is saying. I know that incidents like these have happened in our school, but that does not mean we are not doing anything. I am personally looking into such matters. If we get to know about any such students, we call them along with their parents for counseling. And when it comes to taking tough steps, our school has even expelled some of the students who were involved in incidents of ragging," said Vishisht.

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When asked why students belonging to modern and educated families indulge in such wild practices, Vishisht said, "Look, there are several reasons why these kids take to these things. Maybe due to a disturbed background or other societal issues."

But isn't school the place where kids are taught how to behave and become a good human being?

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"Yes, it is. And we are doing all that here. But no one can give you 100 per cent guarantee. There are other good schools and colleges, still there are terrorists and anti-social elements," said the Headmaster.

Unsaid though is clearly that this is an embarrassing moment for an institution like Lawrence School, which has CEC Navin Chawala, actors Sanjay Dutt and Saif Ali Khan, and political leader Maneka Gandhi as its alumni. And Jashan Shergill's story does not add to its prestige.