ITANAGAR, 8 Nov: The Arunachal Pradesh State Commission for Protection of Child Rights (APSCPCR) has strongly condemned the alleged incident of sexual assault on a minor boy by a monk in the Arunachal Pali Vidyapith (APV) in Chowkham in Namsai district.
Taking suo moto cognizance of the case, the commission contacted the Lohit SP and sought the status report of the case.
“It was informed that a case (u/s 377/506 IPC r/w Section 6 of the POCSO Act, 2012) has been registered at the Chongkham police station,” the commission said in a press statement.
APSCPCR Chairperson Gumri Ringu contacted Namsai DC RK Singh and demanded that a detailed investigation be carried out at the APV “to unearth possibilities of any other victims and perpetrators under similar offence.”
The commission has directed the Namsai district child protection officer (DCPO) to provide counselling to the victim at the earliest and follow up the case.
“The rising number of incidences of such condemnable crimes against children in the state is a matter of grave concern, especially when the innocent minors are subject to such atrocities by persons under whose care they have been entrusted to,” the APSCPCR said.
It appealed to all the deputy commissioners and DCPOs to “make frequent inspection visits to all educational institutes, especially those with residential facilities, under their jurisdiction.”
The APSCPCR also requested the education commissioner to “issue necessary directives to all the private schools in the state to conduct mandatory police verification of all the staff, both teaching and non-teaching, employed under their respective school administration, and make it available to be scrutinized during surprise inspections conducted in the schools by authorized personnel from time to time.”
