Madras High Court today ordered notice to authorities on a petition seeking compensation for the death of a class VI student, who drowned in a swimming pool at an amusement park during a school excursion.
Petitioner D Eswaran, father of the deceased E Prabakaran,sought adequate compensation contending that the school had failed to perform its quasi-parental responsibility.
Alleging that the management of the Sri Lakshmi School in neighbouring Tiruvallur and police harassed and threatened him to withdraw his complaint over the death of his son last year, he also sought a thorough inquiry into the incident.
When the matter came up for hearing, Justice R Subbiah yesterday ordered notice to authorities, and directed the additional government pleader P Sanjai Gandhi to get instructions from the school education department.
According to the petitioner, the school had taken its students on excursion to "Queens Land Amusement Park" near here on February 21, 2015.
At 2 pm, he received a phone call from a teacher saying
his son Prabakaran had been hospitalised as he had suffered breathing problem. But when he rushed to the hospital, he was informed that his son had died due to drowning.
The petitioner alleged that even before the postmortem the
school management and local police were keen to strike "a deal" with him.
He alleged no mandatory RDO inquiry was conducted into the
incident, and he was not furnished a copy of the post-mortem report.
Suspecting foul play, he claimed the school failed in its
responsibility and teachers behaved in an irresponsible manner in dealing with the incident.
The high court allowed the application for impleadment of
the deceased's sister, who has alleged foul play in her brother's death.
The bench, meanwhile, asked the counsel for the parties concerned to find out whether senior advocate F S Nariman, who was appointed as the amicus curiae to assist the Supreme Court in the matter, will continue to help out in the case.
The court has now fixed the matter for further hearing on March 28.
The bench further said that a life has been lost and it is a matter of great pain.
"We want that it should not be repeated again. We should ensure that this should not take place in future," it said.
It, however, said that we have to find out the reason for the death of law student.
Earlier, the Supreme Court had directed the university's founder president Ashok K Chauhan to file affidavit detailing action taken on the incident.
The PIL was instituted after taking note of the letter written to then CJI T S Thakur by Raghav Sharma, a close friend of the deceased and a 4th-year law student.
It has been claimed that Rohilla, who could not attend classes for quite some time due to various reasons including his physical health, was depressed over the prospect of not being allowed to take the examination by the college because of lack of attendance.
The letter has blamed the Amity authorities for Rohilla's suicide.
Alleging harassment by his teachers, his classmates had taken to social media and launched protests on campus after his death demanding action against his professors, two of whom have since resigned.
The letter to the CJI had also sought that the apex court should take cognisance of the incident and order a probe by an independent committee in such matters.
It also referred to the letter written by the student before taking the extreme step that he "might not mentally survive" the debarment.
The college had said that the student had 43 per cent attendance, whereas the attendance requirement of the university was 75 per cent.
