Hyderabad: Parents, school slug it out on WhatsApp link

Hyderabad: Meena Reddy’s six-year-old son was among those expelled from Gaudium School because his mother had joined a WhatsApp group by school parents.  “My son is only six years old and doesn’t even know the meaning of termination and he is being terminated from the school for no mistake of his. He has asked me many times why he is not going to school and I have no answer to his question. No one ever called me to quit the WhatsApp group but we received the mail in which we were asked to leave the group. I have been targeted and my son is being terminated and I don’t even know the actual reason. My son is in first grade and he is terminated, which is ridiculous,” says a distressed and angry Ms Reddy.  

She says that parents were told that the principal had asked all the children to tell their parents to quit the group. “But how can a school ask first or third grade students to tell us to quit the WhatsApp group? I was told to come to the school on Monday and I was asked if I have any concerns. Though I am not the admin of the group the principal said I am the admin of the group and she has all the screenshots of the group.” 

“We are planning to file a case against of the school because the school authorities are not responding to my calls and texts after terminating the kids. There is nothing wrong in joining a WhatsApp group. And how can a school terminate such young kids for a WhatsApp group?  “The principal should not be bothered with what is happening in a WhatsApp group,” Ms Reddy said.  

A screen grab of the mail sent by Gaudium school to parents.

Another parent said, “Though the Gaudium school has its own open forum, we parents don’t have much time to attend it on a regular basis. As everybody is on WhatsApp, we parents are comfortable using a WhatsApp group. What is wrong in having a parents’ WhatsApp group? It’s February and the exams are scheduled in March so how can a school terminate kids just before the exams?”
G. Kishan, commissioner and director, school education, said that parents should “immediately complain along with evidence to the district education officers and the local police because what the school has done is in violation of child rights, human rights and Right to Education Act.”

School guards did not release kids: parents
 
Being part of a parents’ WhatsApp group could get your child ‘terminated’  from school. The school also sent an email to parents asking them to withdraw from the group.  On February 6 he got a call from his son Aditya’s teacher complaining that the boy had said something bad about his first standard teacher. “I said that it is impossible as Aditya adores that teacher. She also said that for the last many months, Aditya was misbehaving in the bus. I asked how come when we met her last month she didn’t tell me this.”

When he went to the school with his wife to collect his kids, he says they were not allowed inside the school.  “The kids were held by security staff and not released till they received instructions from the school. Even other parents were insulted by the principal and asked to get out of her room on the allegation that the mother had joined the WhatsApp group. My daughter told me she was asked if her father had left the WhatsApp group. She said that she doesn’t know, so she was asked to collect her belongings and put it in a bag. Later in the evening we received an email on termination of students due to misbehaviour of parents and joining the social group,” Mr Singh adds.