Srinagar: Private Schools’ Association of Jammu and Kashmir (PSAJK) today said that the recent viral video of a Kupwara school needs to be seen in its entirety including the background before jumping to conclusions and using it as a tool to harass schools and teachers.

The Association said that the video has been shown out of context and people need to know the entire truth before drawing conclusions.

“The reality is that there is a student who according to his father was getting into bad behaviour. The student was not listening to his father, wasn’t studying, was into fighting and there was danger of the student falling into a bad company/habits. Despite his many attempts the father was unable to teach him manners. So as a last resort he approached a teacher to help him in this matter,” said G N Var, chairman PSAJK.

“In the tuition classroom, everybody was there. The person who was shown holding an axe was not even teacher. He was a painter, who had left the school many months back. So where does the question of teacher threatening student arises?”

Showing of axe is undoubtedly going too far, which shouldn’t have happened.

A delegation of PSAJK headed by Zonal President Shahnawaz Lone recently visited Bright Future Educational Institute Wagat Handwara to ascertain the facts. The findings of the delegation are as under.

1) The Video was made by the Ex-teacher Jahangeer Ahmad Rather in the month of February 2019 during winter vacations.

2) The person having Axe in the hand (in Video) is an assistant and was working as a peon cum helper in winter tuition Academy. However he is a painter by profession and is no more in the school. He had left the school few months back.

3) The delegation interacted with the teachers, students and other civil society members of the village. Contrary to the hue and cry generated in media, most of the locals termed it a harmless incident which was used to instil discipline in a student. They were happy with approach of school.

4) The delegation also met Deputy Chief Education officer Handwara, ZEO Concerned and the representatives of District legal services Authority and Child welfare Committee Srinagar and police officials who also visited the school during our presence there. Deliberations were held with all visiting officials.

5) The father of the student also gave a statement stating that he had asked the teacher to take such a step so that his son becomes disciplined.

The PSAJK has condemned the harassment of teachers and school authorities in the name of this video. “This is an irony. Police have arrested principal and chairman of the school, who have nothing to do with it. They were on holidays when the incident happened. And the incident happened in private tuitions and not in any working school classroom,” said Var. “There are proper channels at different levels where such complaint has to be tackled. The school discipline committee or the Zonal education department was never approached.”

The Association said that with the action of police, the career of more than 300 students is being jeopardised. “If these arrests of people not directly connected with video continues, the school will closed and students will suffer,” said Var. “We appeal authorities not to get swayed with the videos circulated with malicious intent and without verifying its background and talking to all stakeholders. If anybody has violated any law book that particular person accordingly and not go on hounding everybody.