Government abdicates its responsibility and NGOs make marry... http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/hyderabad/School-for-blind-had-no-state-recognition/articleshow/38891507.cms KAKINADA: A day after the outrageous expose of the merciless thrashing of blind students at a school run by a voluntary organisation, a local court has sent the correspondent and principal of Good Field Blind School to remand, even as the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) swung into action, taking suo motto cognizance of the offence and issuing notices to Andhra Pradesh chief secretary and East Godavari district collector. The NHRC said it has sought a reply from the district collector in four weeks.
On Tuesday, the correspondent of the school KV Rao (the senior most administrator of the school after the principal) and the principal A Srinivas were booked under section 324 read with 34 of IPC (voluntarily causing hurt by dangerous weapons or means) and section 7/ 23 and 25 of the Juvenile Justice Act (punishment for cruelty to juvenile or child), all of which are said to be bailable. Meanwhile several irregularities have come to light in the running of the school, which was being run by the Good Field Trust. While the school did not have state government recognition, it is also learnt to have been encroaching on nearly two acres of panchayat land meant for community purposes. Villagers of Timmapuram panchayat said that while only 600 sq yd land was allotted to the school, the trust had constructed a boundary wall around the remaining vacant land kept aside for community purposes. "Till date, we were under the impression that the entire site belongs to the school trust. But revenue officials are now saying that they have not given any orders allowing the trust to occupy the remaining land," V Srinivasa Rao, a villager, said. According to sources, KV Rao managed to secure the site for the blind school at a site marked out for community purposes nearly four and a half years ago on humanitarian grounds with the help of the then district collector Ravi Chandra and Timmapuram sarpanch Bejawada Satyanaryana. According to Satyanaryana, who is also the Good Field Trust chairman, the Timmapuram village panchayat had adopted the resolution to allot part of the land marked for community purposes to the trust based on the recommendations of the then collector. Confirming that these irregularities had come to light, Kakinda Revenue Divisional Officer (RDO) told TOI that they were now searching for the proceedings of the former collector. "The school trust chairman is saying that collector had given the recommendation. On the other hand, the school does not have recognition. We have learnt that an NGO Good News set up the Green Field Trust to run the school. They are running the school illegally," the RDO said. Interestingly, the correspondent of the school was working as a teacher in another blind school in Visakhapatnam and was on medical leave for the past few months. Rao, who is also visually impaired, had mercilessly thrashed the school inmates, all aged below 12 years, after they allegedly played outside the school premises. Meanwhile the AP Commission for Protection of Child Rights said in a release that its members would be visiting the blind school on Wednesday afternoon and would also hold meetings with the district collector and other district officials. On Tuesday, many parents took away their wards from the school and the remaining inmates were put under the surveillance of three teachers of the Sarva Siksha Abhayan scheme, the district education officer (DEO) Srinivasulu Reddy told mediapersons. -- Avinash Shahi M.Phil Research Scholar Centre for The Study of Law and Governance Jawaharlal Nehru University New Delhi India Register at the dedicated AccessIndia list for discussing accessibility of mobile phones / Tabs on: http://mail.accessindia.org.in/mailman/listinfo/mobile.accessindia_accessindia.org.in Search for old postings at: http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/ To unsubscribe send a message to [email protected] with the subject unsubscribe. To change your subscription to digest mode or make any other changes, please visit the list home page at http://accessindia.org.in/mailman/listinfo/accessindia_accessindia.org.in Disclaimer: 1. Contents of the mails, factual, or otherwise, reflect the thinking of the person sending the mail and AI in no way relates itself to its veracity; 2. AI cannot be held liable for any commission/omission based on the mails sent through this mailing list..
