http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/10-years-after-Godhra-communal-violence-Gujarat-still-shielding-government-staff/articleshow/12063601.cms
EVADING ACTION
No lessons learnt
24 Teachers Accused Of Riots Are Back On Job, Finds RTI Query
Radha Sharma | TNN
Ahmedabad: A Right to Information (RTI) application by activist Usman Sheikh in Sabarkantha has revealed that 24 teachers teaching in government primary schools, grant-in-aid high schools and one even in a college were accused of rioting in 2002. Sabarkantha had seen violence in Prantij, Idar, Himmatnagar and other parts. All these teachers were charge-sheeted. Ten had got anticipatory bail while the rest spent time in police and judicial custody. Some cases are pending but all of them are back on the jobs, teaching the children.
Sheikh had sought details from the district police of people working with government and semi-government organizations who were accused of rioting in 2002 and if their departments or seniors were informed when they spent over 48 hours in police custody which forms the basis of suspension. Of the details of 45 people given by the police, 24 were teachers. Four of them teach in primary schools, one is a school principal, one head teacher. Two are retired teachers. The rest are all teachers in high school teaching students of impressionable age.
“Police officials have on record admitted that they did not inform the departments concerned or the senior officials of those charge-sheeted in rioting,” says Sheikh.
When he took the matter forward himself and sent RTI applications to schools whose teachers were charge-sheeted, all of them responded that none of their teachers was involved in post-Godhra communal carnage. “These teachers are teaching innocent minds. Whether they are being consciously protected or their seniors are really ignorant is a matter to be probed,” says Sheikh.
Director of Nyaygruh and eminent activist Harsh Mandar says information of a big number of teachers accused of communal rioting is deeply disturbing. “We have always believed that real battle against communalism will not be fought by police, it will be fought by hearts and mind of ordinary people. But if the minds of the teachers are communally biased, there is a high risk of them poisoning innocent minds in classrooms”.
Mandar said that no action against these teachers who continue to teach amounts to normalization of communal prejudice in classrooms which is more dangerous. “The government needs to take action against such teachers and cleanse the classrooms”, he said.
Nyaygruh state co-ordinator Preeta Jha says that involvement of teachers in rioting underlines communalization of education in Gujarat. It also debunks the myth that uneducated, poor people spontaneously went on a communal rampage to loot and kill. “These people were educated but some also in charge of educating the future of the state”, says Preeta.
Army man accused of rioting
An army man too figures in the list of government personnel accused of rioting. Mahesh alias Mayur Moti Patel of Nana Poshina village in Idar has been accused of being part of 11 people in a mob who set the house of Valibhai Mansuri afire. A case was filed against him in 2002 in which a summary closure was filed. Later, the case was re-opened following the SC directive. He is currently released on bail and villagers say that he is reported to be on duty somewhere in Jammu and Kashmir.
|
