Emergency PTA meeting over child abuse incident in city

Mangalore Today News Network

Mangaluru, Jan 02, 2018: An alarming complaint of child molestation in a private school in central business district area of the city has forced the convening of an emergency meeting today, Jan 2, Tuesday.

An incident that took place outside the school premises on Jan 1,  Monday has sent shock waves among top echelons of the school management, which, in turn, has decided to convene an emergency meeting of the Parent Teachers Association and stakeholders to deal with the resultant fall out. However, the child’s father is not keen to press charges.

The incident purportedly involves the driver of a private vehicle that ferried the class V student to and from school every day. With the student confiding about the incident with the principal after a neighbour alerted the mother to the possibility of her daughter being abused, the mother approached the principal for guidance. The principal, in turn, convened the child safety committee meeting and also kept the school management including the secretary and the correspondent informed.

The committee has decided to call parents of all students who use this private vehicle to school for an emergency meeting today Jan 2,Tuesday. The committee and the management will ascertain facts of the purported abuse from other students and their parents as well in addition to the student abused in question. The committee also decided to take the president of school van drivers’ association in to confidence about the breach of trust committed by one of their members in this incident.


The school in the interim discreetly refreshed guidelines pertaining to good touch and bad touch with the students and asked them to report any such incident immediately to their parents as well as their teachers. Having undertaken this exercise earlier in the academic year, the school in wake of the incident felt it prudent to remind the students to the perils they face from sexual predators in their daily lives, especially by those who are close to them by daily association.