In this UP school, Dalit children face constant violence

The incidents have been reportedly going on for a while in Banpurwa Government Primary School

An Amethi school has grabbed headlines for notorious reasons - caste-based violence against students as young as 10 years old.

The Uttar Pradesh school's headmistress Kusum Soni, now suspended, has been accused of assaulting Dalit students and engaging in segregational practices against them such as making them line-up for mid-day meals separately and making them sit away from the other students, according to The Indian Express.

The incidents, which have been reported to be going on for a while now in Banpurwa Government Primary School, started to garner attention when a ten year old Dalit child, Jyoti Rao, fessed up to his family about Soni's violent practices.

The child, who is reportedly reluctant to speak, is only comfortable to talk with her parents around.

“We are made to sit separately during lunch time… The teacher (headmistress) is always late herself, but if someday we are even slightly late, we are beaten up. If we do anything even slightly wrong, we are beaten up", she was quoted telling The Indian Express.

Soni, children of the school say, had beaten them up in the past too. When their greiviances had once reached the 'pradhan' of Ganderi village, Vinay Kumar, she had trashed the students.

Kumar and the kin of one of the children filed a complaint against Soni for caste-discrimination on Tuesday after which an FIR was registered against her name.

On Tuesday, the pradhan, Vinay Kumar, and the grandparent of one of the students filed a complaint with the local SHO against Soni, accusing her of caste discrimination.

“I went to the school along with my representative Pawan Dubey and did not find the headmistress", Kumar said in his complaint, according to The Indian Express.

A tweet by Kumar on the issue had been noticed by Basic Siksha Adhikari Arvind Pathak who revealed that following this Soni had been suspended and an FIR had been registered against her for discrimination along Caste lines.

Although Soni denies the charges against her, the FIR reveals that she also used castiest slurs while speaking to the Dalit children.

This is unfortunately not a one-time occurrence in Uttar Pradesh. Just days earlier, action was taken against a school in Mainpuri for making Dalit pupils keep their utensils separately, according to The Indian Express.

Check out the latest DH videos: