A case has been registered against a 29-year-old private schoolteacher in connection with the death of a minor girl student by suicide in Kasaragod district of Kerala, police said on Thursday. The case was registered against Usman, a native of Adhur in the district, under Section 12 of POCSO Act and Section 75 of the Juvenile Justice Act, days after the 12-year-old girl died by suicide.
He is absconding now and a manhunt is on to trace him. According to police, the accused had sent inappropriate messages to the girl, a class-eight student studying in the same school, via social media.
A senior police officer told PTI that the victim's parents had come across the chat messages exchanged by the duo and warned the girl against it. Her father also brought the issue to the notice of the school management who in turn took up the matter with Usman, he said.
also read
- High-voltage fight in Kerala: Rahul Gandhi, Tharoor among big guns in fray
- Lok Sabha polls: Kerala Left Front MLA kicks up row saying ‘Rahul Gandhi's DNA should be examined’
- Meet Satheeshan, the guardian angel of motorists at Kerala's Kancor Junction
- Two Austrian Jewish women who tore down pro-Palestine poster in Kochi booked
"The messages were improper for a teacher to send to a 12-year-old student. The girl was suspected to have ended her life out of mental tension as her parents read the chat messages," the officer said, adding that these all were assumptions and they could arrive at a conclusion only after a detailed probe.
Meanwhile, the victim's father told the media that his daughter had ended her life following the mental harassment by the teacher.
