A case has been filed against the principal of a government school in Tamil Nadu’s Tirunelveli district for forcing an eight-year-old Dalit student to pick a stone out of a toilet on campus. The principal, identified as Ponrani from the Saiva Vellalar (Forward Caste) community, allegedly forced the child to pick a stone that had fallen into the toilet saying that “it was the kind of job the student’s community members did”.
The student is from the Arunthathiyar community, categorised as Scheduled Caste. Tirunelveli (Rural) Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP) Anantha Raj M, who is investigating the case, said the incident happened on December 6.
The child complained to his parents and the mother filed a complaint against Ponrani on December 9, said DSP Anantha Raj. An FIR had been registered on the same day and that Section 31(r) of the Prevention of Atrocities Against Scheduled Castes/Scheduled Tribes Act and Section 75 of the Juvenile Justice Act have been evoked. However the principal is yet to be arrested and that preliminary investigations are ongoing, said the officer.
The case is the latest in the growing list of caste crimes in Tirunelveli district. Earlier in November, six men from the Maravar community (Other Backward Class) were arrested for assaulting, disrobing, and urinating on two Dalit youths near the Thamirabarani River. The Marvar men also robbed the Dalit youth of their cell phones and silver jewellery. In the same month, a 17-year-old was arrested for hurling country bombs at a computer centre in Nanguneri owned by Jaya TV journalist Vanamalai, who had extensively covered a caste crime that occurred in the area in October.
Read: Six arrested for disrobing, assaulting, urinating on Dalits in Tirunelveli
Before that, in October, a 17-year-old Nadar boy (Other Backward Class) stalked and killed an 18-year-old Dalit woman from the Devendra Kula Vellalar community in Tirunelveli town. Earlier in August, two Dalit siblings aged 17 and 14 were horrifically attacked with sickles in their own home by their own schoolmates from the Maravar caste.
In July this year, a 19-year-old Dalit youth was stabbed to death in Appuvilai village by a Nadar man in a suspected case of ‘honour’ killing.
In November, TNM travelled across Tirunelveli and neighbouring districts and found that from home to schools, children are deeply entrenched in caste supremacy. TNM found that the neighbouring Thoothukudi and Tenkasi districts, like Tirunelveli continue to be hotbeds for caste atrocities despite the ruling Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK)’s promises of social justice.
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