‘My three-year-old was abused despite all precautions’

The mother said that she has been worried about the safety of her two daughters after the series of sexual assaults in schools last year.

“I have heard about sexual assaults in schools and was always cautious. I never let anyone look after my child. How much more can I do,” asked the broken and exhausted 28-year-old mother of the three-year-old girl, who was allegedly sexually assaulted in her school on Monday.

Speaking to The Hindu at the Bowring and Lady Curzon Hospital on Tuesday, she recalled how the series of sexual assaults in schools last year had made her constantly worried about the safety of her two daughters.

She said her neighbours felt she was bordering on paranoia, as she would insist that her daughters and son were picked up from school by her husband and no one else.

Recalling the sequence of events on Monday, the victim’s father said, “I picked her up at noon, like I always do. She did not speak much. Once home, she started crying inconsolably and shivering. Only when my wife got angry and forced her to speak did she finally say something.”

The mother added, “When I wanted to change her clothes, she resisted. That’s when I saw she was injured and in severe pain. We rushed her to the hospital.”

Reports awaited

After hours of medical examination, sources confirmed sexual assault. But the police said the medical reports were awaited.

When the victim and her four-year-old sister, who studies in the same school, were shown photos of male members of the school staff, both instantly pointed to the school watchman and said he was “the uncle who would buy them mithai ”. The police have now arrested the 30-year-old watchman as the prime suspect. Meanwhile, on Tuesday morning, a protest in front of the school by members of the Thadou Students’ Association went awry when a scuffle broke out after they were asked to disperse by the police. Many of them were injured, and one girl was detained by the police.