The sexual assault on two four-year-old female kindergarten students at a school in Badlapur in Thane district has shaken up the entire country. If it were not for the massive public outrage, the police and the school would have swept everything under the rug. Police apathy and the school administration’s indifference were as shocking as the hideous crime.
The school attendant who allegedly assaulted the girls must be brought to justice. Action should also be taken against the policemen and school administration responsible, and at the same time, systemic failures should not be allowed to go on like so.
Initially, the Badlapur police had not only refused to register the case, but they also treated the parents of the victims as criminals and made the mother of one of the girls sit at the police station for nearly 10 hours. While acting against errant police officers, the authorities should also take steps to change this culture in police departments across the country.
Ordinary citizens are often discouraged from filing police complaints despite a Supreme Court guideline mandating that a police officer cannot refuse to register an FIR when the crime requires investigation. The guideline says that in the event of the investigating officer concluding that the crime was not committed within his jurisdiction, the FIR should be forwarded to the appropriate police station, but there should be no refusal to register the FIR.
Similarly, even after the parents approached them, the school administration did not inform the police about the incident, as mandated by the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act. This tendency to hush up cases of sexual offences against women and children is seen in institutes across the country. Their larger concern is their reputation, not the well-being of the victims.
Now that the Bombay high court has suo motu taken cognisance of the matter, hopefully, the state will not get away by merely forming a Special Investigation Team and trying the case before a fast-track court. The state must be made answerable about the larger issue of the safety of women and children.
