School trustees seek pre-arrest bail, claiming they took prompt action

Badlapur sexual assaults

THANE: Two trustees of the school in Badlapur East, where two 4-year-old girls were sexually assaulted by a cleaning staff, have approached the sessions court in Kalyan for pre-arrest bail, claiming that they took prompt action when they came to know about the incidents on August 16. The police have booked the two - Uday Kotwal (trust president) and Tushar Apte (trust secretary) - along with school principal Archana Athavle for failing to report the incidents to the police.

In their pre-arrest bail pleas, Kotwal and Apte have claimed that the school principal did not inform them about the sexual assaults immediately after she came to know about the same. They said that they came to know about the assaults for the first time on August 16 and immediately started an inquiry. On checking CCTV footage, they realised that the CCTVs were not working.

The trustees further said that on August 16, they went to the police station to report the incidents and get a case registered, but the police refused to take their complaint and told them that they were registering an FIR based on the complaint lodged by parents of one of the girls.

Meanwhile, cleaning staff member Akshay Shinde was formally arrested by the state-appointed Special Investigation Team in a second case registered in connection with the sexual assaults and produced before a special POCSO (Protection of Children from Sexual Offences) Act court in Kalyan. Special judge PP Mule remanded Shinde to 14 days judicial custody, as the public prosecutor Ashwini Bhamrepatil did not seek his further police custody remand.

The second case was registered by the police against Shinde, school trustees, and the principal in connection with the alleged sexual assault on one of the two kindergarten girls, said a police officer. The 24-year-old accused had allegedly sexually assaulted the girl in the washroom and the girl had informed her parents about the incident immediately on returning home. The next day, the parents had taken the child to a private doctor, who confirmed that the child was sexually assaulted, the officer added.

He further said that on August 14, the parents went to the school and informed the principal about the incident, but the principal refused to believe them and maintained that it could not have happened in the school. When the parents requested the CCTV footage, they were informed that the CCTV cameras were not connected to a DVR and, therefore, no footage was available.

Meanwhile, the railway court on Friday granted bail to 35 protesters who were detained by the Kalyan Government Railway Police on August 20 for protesting on railway tracks against the sexual assaults of the pre-primary girls. A team of lawyers from the Kalyan court chose to represent the protesters pro bono. Advocate Vishal Kedare argued the pleas of the protestors, all of whom are from Badlapur and Ambernath.