Nandini R Iyer, Hindustan Times
New Delhi, July 25, 2007
New Delhi, July 25, 2007
A high-level committee has been set up by Minister for Women and Child Development (WCD) Renuka Chowdhury to inquire into the alleged brutal sexual abuse of a 10-year-old boy in the Capital. The minister’s decision to set up the probe panel is unprecedented — usually it is state governments that deal with such cases. The panel will meet on Wednesday.
Chowdhury told the Hindustan Times: “The 10-year-old child was studying in a school in north-west Delhi. He was sodomised daily for three months last year by three school staffers — a manager, a teacher and another employee.”
The minister, who met the child’s parents on Monday, was clearly upset. “The parents came to me terrified and disheartened. I was in tears. This is one of the most horrifying cases that has ever come to my notice,” she said.
“The parents discovered it by accident because the child was becoming physically and mentally ill. When they took him to hospital, they learnt he was being sodomised,” Chowdhury said.
The minister said the child subsequently identified the three men who had abused him. The Delhi Police registered a first information report (FIR) and arrested two of the accused. The third is absconding. Both the arrested men are, however, believed to have resumed their jobs at the school.
“In the meantime, the parents are being threatened repeatedly,” Chowdhury said. “When a child so young is the victim of sexual abuse, the system cannot be so helpless as to not react. The child will have to relive the horror every time the matter is investigated,” she said.
