Jharkhand school principal justifies molesting 7-year-old. Can it get any worse?
We attach little value to mental health
It is appalling that sexual assault on school campuses is no “stray incident” anymore. Amid raging debates over campus safety and responsibility of teachers, the number of such incidents is rising across the country. What shakes us is that in many cases, teachers — who are supposed to be the protectors — are becoming the perpetrators. And all words fall silent when a principal molests an upper kindergarten student and then offers a justification by saying that it wasn’t a “big mistake” as there was no intercourse involved.
S Xavier, a school principal in Jharkhand’s Koderma district, reportedly molested a seven-year-old child on Wednesday: according to the child’s account, he stripped and touched her inappropriately. He also gave her some money and asked her not to report the incident to anyone.
And when his abominable act was exposed, he admitted to it, presenting a justification for violating the child — expressing no remorse for the crime.
“Yes I did, but it wasn’t such a big mistake. There was no sexual intercourse. Let me be frank, I could not even have done it, I’m old now. It was an accident,” the 65-year-old principal said.
“I am under a lot of stress. My work is not going well. I have heart trouble. I can’t sleep at night sometimes. I have insomnia,” he added, as an excuse for the crime .
Nothing can justify sexual assault
The constant attempts to justify and cover up such incidents reveal how our education system is failing our children — the very future of this country. First, there aren't adequate safety measures. There aren't enough teachers to monitor the children. Forget about CCTVs. In cases like this, where a principal takes a child to the washroom, no safety measure could have saved the child.
Then, there are powerful attempts to dismiss and whittle down such cases. The parents will be threatened. Taking children out of schools can't possibly better the situation, as other schools may not agree to admit a victim of sexual assault — as was witnessed in a recent case in Delhi, where schools denied admission to a four-year-old sexual assault survivor.
Qualifying an act of sexual assault sans penetration as “a small mistake” does not behove any human being. In a similar incident at Kolkata’s GD Birla school, where a four-year-old has been molested by two physical training teachers, fellow teachers qualified the crime as a “mischief”.
Not having intercourse is not a leeway. A principal should have known that
According to the Protection of Children From Sexual Offences Act, 2012, sexual assault does not necessarily have to penetrative. “Whoever, with sexual intent touches the vagina, penis, anus or breast of the child or makes the child touch the vagina, penis, anus or breast of such person or any other person, or does any other act with sexual intent which involves physical contact without penetration is said to commit sexual assault.”
“Whoever, commits sexual assault, shall be punished with imprisonment of either description for a term which shall not be less than three years but which may extend to five years, and shall also be liable to fine.”
This principal is not aware of this. So, what if somebody else (any staff of the school) had subjected another student of his school to similar assault? He would not have found anything wrong as he thinks it is quite okay to strip a girl in the washroom and touch her inappropriately as long as there is "no penetration". In his own case, he tried to use age in his defence.
Such principals sustain our education system
The principal said that he could not have raped the girl given his age. We should hang our heads in shame that we have developed an education system in which such a person could become a school principal. Who could even anticipate such a situation involving a seven-year-old? It is every parent's waking nightmare.
Besides the remorselessness, the principal is guilty of what he said — of pushing down a child’s development down the priority list as the head of an educational institution.
Nobody is talking about mental health
Dismissing non-penetrative sexual assault, as the principal has done, reveals the little value we attach to mental health as a society. Teachers can’t afford to be this blunt; they must understand that they are not dealing with machines. They are dealing with children who don’t know what intercourse is, or the difference between penetrative and unpenetrative assault. They may not have any visible wound. But harrowing memories like this will haunt them for long.
Not only hapless parents but also schools, teachers and principals should start educating themselves and the children about this reality. The schools should also talk more about the mental health of teachers who are capable of such crime and then become defensive about it, betraying not the slightest regret.