A self-reliant and studious child, wise beyond his years, who wanted to become a scientist, is how 12-year-old Prince's family remembers him, a week after he died from being allegedly thrashed by a teacher at school.
At their three-room house in Greater Noida's Bambawar village, Prince's father, Devdutt, 38, is still finding it hard to come to terms with his son, the brightest in his class, being caned brutally for failing a Hindi test.
“He did not have a lot of friends. Prince mostly focused on his studies and pursuing his dreams of becoming a scientist. His classmates told us that their teacher had given them a Hindi test, in which a few students, including Prince, failed. Why would someone beat a child over such a small thing?” says the grief-stricken father.
Sequence of events
On the morning of October 7, Mr. Devdutt dropped his three children, including Prince, at their school, as he did every day. At 12 p.m., an hour before the closing of the school, he received a call from the accused teacher — Shobharan — informing him that his eldest son had fallen unconscious. “After I rushed to his school, I saw my son lying on the ground, covered in his own vomit,” Mr. Devdutt told The Hindu.
He rushed his son to a clinic in Dadri followed by a local hospital, where he was asked to take his son to Delhi for better treatment.
“The initial CT scans showed bleeding from his brain, which caused it to swell. I rushed my child to two hospitals in Delhi, both of which denied admission saying they didn’t have the required medical equipment to treat him,” the father alleged. Prince breathed his last at LNJP hospital at 9 a.m. on October 8. The doctors there told Mr. Devdutt that the delay in admitting his son had led to a further buildup of fluids inside his brain.
Accused held
Shobharan, who was absconding for three days following the incident, has been booked under IPC section 304 pertaining to culpable homicide not amounting to murder.
“He was detained on Tuesday and has been cooperating with the investigation so far. He has confessed that he beat Prince with a cane. Prince’s classmates we spoke to also claimed that Shobharan often used to thrash students in class. We are still awaiting the post-mortem report,” said DCP (Central Noida) Ram Badan Singh.
Mr. Devdutt says that his son had been beaten by the same teacher on an earlier occasion. “Months before the incident, I saw bruise marks on Prince’s thighs, which he later told me were the result of his teacher’s caning. I wish I had taken it seriously then,” he says, adding that Prince’s two younger siblings have been scarred by the incident and also have been reportedly beaten by Shobharan.
Holding back his tears, Prince's 70-year-old grandfather Sher Singh said his grandson was unlike other children. “We always believed he would achieve great things in life if he received proper guidance. He once lit up his cycle with a string of LED lights with the help of a mobile battery. The other day, an air cooler at home stopped working but he fixed it within an hour,” Singh recalled.
Prince’s mother Meenakshi said, “He had learnt to cook all kinds of meals simply from watching me in the kitchen. We had faith that Prince would excel in life but it was tragically cut short, because of a trivial exam.”
Published - October 14, 2022 02:23 am IST
