The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) also wrote to the Believers Church English Medium School in Alappuzha seeking clarification on the news reports about the girl’s ouster, an official statement released through the Press Information Bureau (PIB) said Thursday.
The letter from the Board states that such action is prima facie a violation of its affiliation bylaws. The school was directed to give immediate clarification “before the Board takes further appropriate action”.
Director of Public Instruction (DPI) APM Muhammad Haneesh asked the chief district administrator in Alappuzha district to convene a meeting between the girl’s parents and the school management and sort out the issue as the Kerala town witnessed street protests for the second consecutive day.
A march taken out by the Campus Front, a feeder outfit of the Social Democratic Party of India (SDPI), turned violent at the school premises, giving the police a tough time. Political parties, both the ruling and in the opposition, also staged protests against the school.
According to reports, the authorities started enforcing strict dress code after the school affiliated to the CBSE was taken over by the cash-rich church from the Sree Narayana Dharma Paripalana Yogam of the Hindu Ezhava community last year after it ran into huge losses.
The DPI initiated action on the basis of an inquiry by the Deputy Director of Education found that found ‘merit’ in the student’s complaint. Alappuzha Revenue Divisional Officer (RDO) A Gopakumar has also submitted a similar report.
“The DDE’s interim report states that the level of cooperation extended to the inquiry by the school authorities was not up to the expected level. The school’s clarification also sounded not convincing to him,” Haneesh said.
T.N. Nabala, a Class 10 student at the school, had lodged a complaint with the district authorities saying she was given a compulsory transfer certificate by the school authorities last month as she refused to give up headscarves. The school gave her TC to a local government school under the state board and she found the shift in curriculum difficult to adjust at this juncture.
The reason for the shift was given as “Maftha is not allowed in this school” but the school authorities say the TC was sought by the girl’s parents after she was promoted to Class 10 and her mother insisted on the cited reason mentioned in the certificate. A church spokesman also said the school showed no discrimination against any community and it was ready to take back the student.
“We have 150 Muslim students here and most of them attend classes with head scarf. We have not objected to it. This appears to be an attempt to tarnish the institution,” “There’s no basis to the allegation that there’s discrimination on the basis of religion here,” said Lebi Philip Mathew, the public relations officer of the church.
The State Human Rights Commission also swung into action by registering a case against the school authorities and ordering the Principal Secretary, General Education, to conduct an inquiry and submit report within 15 days.
“If the incident is true, it violated individual and religious freedom,” the commission member KE Gangadharan said in a statement here Thursday.
The Muslim Students Federation meanwhile alleged that several schools in the state were showing religious discrimination on the dress code and threatened to launch agitation against them.