The suicide of a Class X student from a Mapusa school, who was allegedly caught copying is not just tragic, but if the allegations of the relatives and the girl’s classmates are true, it exposes the callous attitude of the school authorities. It reveals also the lack of an adequate support system for people who are desperate and believe that taking their own life is the only way out.
The girl did not commit suicide because she was caught copying but allegedly because the school authorities announced in the school that she had been caught copying. Students confirm this and the girl’s relatives told Herald that the girl told her parents that this had happened and it was this that led to her consuming poison. The school authorities deny that the girl’s name was announced on the speakers. But, whether announced on the speakers on through any other method, this ‘name and shame’ strategy of the school needs to be condemned in the strongest possible terms. This is not the way in which a school management should act. Corporal punishment has been made illegal, that doesn’t mean that schools can resort to other forms of punishment. This is a form of torture and a child cannot be corrected through torture but by being made to understand what the fault is and how this has to be changed. In the instant case this was not done.
It is imperative that a teacher should understand how vulnerable a child is and realise how such a move can impact a child’s feelings leading to various fears. While the police await a formal complaint, the Education Department has already initiated an inquiry in the episode. The inquiry should be expedited and the report, when it is ready, as well as the action taken against the management of the school if it is found guilty of announcing the name of the student must be made public, so as to set an example to other schools in the State. Such incidents cannot have repetitions and a support system needs to be put in place to help students in difficulties. For this reason the inquiry should go beyond just ascertaining whether the school management announced the name of the child. The questions the inquiry needs to find answers to include: Whose decision was it to announce the name of the child during the assembly? Has this been done in the past? Aren’t schools supposed to have counsellors? Where was the counsellor in this case? How did the counsellor react when the student’s name was announced in the Assembly? Why didn’t the child have the courage to approach the counsellor after she was wronged?
This case should also be an eye-opener to the fact that in Goa we need a support system that will help in preventing suicide. COOJ, a NGO that works in the area of mental health in Goa and has a support system for suicide prevention, finds that the problem of suicide in Goa is huge, where the State, according to a study published in the Lancet Journal in 2012, ranked Goa fifth in the country in terms of suicide death in the small state category. Goa had a suicide rate of 18.4 per lakh population as against the national average of 11.7 per lakh population. It is also a fact that most suicides are by people between the age of 15 and 35, as in this case too.
The girl was in her early teens and had her entire life ahead of her. In a few months from now she would have been stepping into the next stage of her scholastic career and from there to the adult world. She had everything to look forward too, but life ended too soon for her. Her death should not go in vain but put an end to any ‘name and shame’ incidents in the future.
