Tension prevails at Bindol village in Raiganj after a para teacher Ms Pampa Roy of Bindol High Madrasa School allegedly eloped with a class IX girl from the minority community of the same school yesterday.
Locals traced both teacher and the girl to the house of one Mr Sunil Ghosh at Bindol this morning. The girl’s guardians and the locals have levelled charges of lesbianism against the teacher.
According to the student’s parents, she went missing yesterday. “Our daughter did not return from school yesterday. Worried, we informed the Bindol gram panchayat pradhan, Mr Debendranath Roy of her disappearance,” said the girl’s father Muhammad Mahiuddin, a resident of Pariharpur village. According to him, locals who had been looking for the missing girl later found out that the teacher was missing too. “The search continued throughout the night and they were traced about a kilometre away from the teacher’s residence, to one Mr Sunil Ghosh’s house at Bindol,” the girl’s father alleged.
Mr Mahiuddin alleged that the para teacher concerned had been sexually harassing his daughter for some time. “The matter has been reported to the pradhan of Bindol gram panchayat with a demand for punishment,” he said. The gram panchayat pradhan Mr Debendranath Roy confirmed that the supposed victim’s father had brought charges of sexual harassment against the para teacher.
The accused teacher Miss Pampa Roy denied the allegation against her and said: “There is no truth in the allegation. I have a friendly relation with the girl and so we decided to spend the night together. The victim neither confirmed nor rejected the sexual harassment charges against her teacher. Her answers to questions on the issue have so far been vague.
Although the girl’s parents have not lodged a police complaint, people are curious to know why the accused teacher took the girl to a house about a kilometre away from her residence after school without intimating her pa-rents.
The house owner Mr Sunil Ghosh was not available for comments but his wife said that their daughter was a student of the school where the teacher is employed and so they knew the teacher. “The teacher and the girl came to our house last evening and expressed their desire to put up for the night. We know nothing beyond that,” Mrs Ghosh, said.