Authorities in Madhya Pradesh’s Sagar district have suggested filing a police report (FIR) against a Christian missionary school there for holding a suspicious human embryo and indulging in “irregularities” with the Right to Information Act’s 2009 implementation at the school.
According to the reports, the proposal came after a two-person team from the State Child Protection Commission conducted an inspection at the Bina Kshetra Missionary-run Nirmal Jyoti Higher Secondary Convent School in MP’s Sagar district on Thursday. A review was conducted after a student’s father complained to the Commission stating that his child was expelled by the school for not paying the fees.
During the inspection, the two members of the Commission, Onkar Singh and Dr. Nivedita Sharma discovered a human embryo in the biology lab of the school. The Principal and the school authorities had no satisfactory answers when asked about it. The police was immediately informed by the members and the embryo has been sent for further investigation.
Dissatisfied with the reply of the principal, the members of the commission checked the documents of the school, as well as inspected the school. There is a guest room on the school’s property that shouldn’t be there, according to Dr. Nivedita Sharma. The commission’s members and officials were not permitted to enter the guest room. In addition, there is no police verification of all staff members. The school land has been diverted for other purposes, which is against the law.
It is important to note that the RTE Act of 2009 mandates private schools to provide free and compulsory education to certain percentage of students. According to reports, during the document examination, discrepancies in the school’s revenue and expenses were also discovered.
“Documents related to school’s recognition, income-expenditure account, fee structure and staff qualification were inspected. Irregularities have also been found with regard to the admission of economically underprivileged students under RTE Act at the school. The school management claims to have given a fee waiver worth Rs 16 lakh to 178 students under the RTE Act. However, upon tallying the claims with the documents, a lone application of the purported student beneficiary surfaced,” the commission noted.
The commission further observed that pressure is being put on people over the matter of school fees. Parents and students are under mental strain as a result of this. The school laboratory houses old, decomposing specimens of creatures and have not received enough chemical protection. The cops have been ordered to look into this and file a report.
