Magistrate submits report on Ruchika’s expulsion from school

CHANDIGARH - The report of a magisterial inquiry into the role of the premier Sacred Heart School in the expulsion of teenaged molestation victim Ruchika Girhotra was finally submitted Thursday, with a top Chandigarh official promising that the guilty would be nailed.

Sub Divisional Magistrate (SDM) Prerna Puri submitted the inquiry report.

“The SDM has submitted the inquiry report to us and we are going to deliver it to Union Territory administrator S.F. Rodrigues for his consideration,” Ram Niwas, home-cum-education secretary of Chandigarh, told reporters here Thursday evening.

Ruchika was expelled from the leading girls’ school for unexplained reasons just a month after she was molested by former Haryana director general of police (DGP) S.P.S. Rathore Aug 12, 1990. She was a Class 10 student at that time. She committed suicide three years later, reportedly due to harassment of her and her family.

Rathore’s daughter was Ruchika’s classmate in the same school and a recent complaint to the police has said Rathore got Ruchika expelled to save his own daughter from embarrassment.

Ram Niwas refused to divulge the details of the report.

“Right now I am not in a position to comment on the contents of this report. However, one thing is sure - we will not spare those proved guilty in the final report,” he stated.

On Dec 29 last year, after Rathore’s sentence of six months in prison following his conviction sparked an outrage, Ram Niwas had ordered a magisterial inquiry into the role of the school management in the expulsion of Ruchika.

The SDM was supposed to submit her inquiry report Monday but it was delayed by three days as the school principal had gone on leave.

The school is governed by the Chandigarh-Shimla diocese and the school authorities have so far maintained that Ruchika was never victimised nor expelled.

While compiling the report, the SDM had questioned school principal Sister Sebastina, Ruchika’s class teacher, some old and present staff of the school as well as complainant Madhu Prakash and her daughter Aradhana, who is the lone eyewitness in the molestation case.

Sources in the inquiry team said the administration is likely to nail the school authorities for their role in the case.