Imphal, Sept 5 : A joint action committee formed by 15 clubs in the valley has called a general strike in Manipur from tomorrow midnight till midnight of September 6. The bandh is in protest against a student going missing from an Imphal East school during class hours on August 19.
Md Rohit, a Class VIII student, disappeared from Hundred Flowers School in Imphal East after classteacher N. Rishikanta punished him following a complaint by a girl student that Rohit made unsolicited calls to her cellphone.
The father of the student Md Yukub Ali, a rickshawpuller from Imphal West who stays in a rented house along with his children in Imphal East, lodged a “missing” report with Heingang police twice. He also lodged a complaint with the school authorities.
Police and school authorities maintained that they were trying to find the missing boy.
Announcing the general strike during a media conference here this afternoon, Manawar Ali, the secretary of the section committee, held the school authorities responsible for the disappearance of the student.
His father expressed apprehension that his son could have committed suicide, unable to bear the “humiliation” meted out to him by the teacher before his classmates. He also feared that the boy could have been misled into joining some militant group.
Charging the school authority with negligence, the action committee also announced that it would close down the school from September 7 if the boy was not traced by then.
The action committee asked parents to withdraw their children now staying in the school’s boarding by September 7. It also announced that the action committee would launch an agitation against the school on September 8. However, the mode of agitation was not disclosed. It warned that it would not be responsible for any “untoward development”.
In an unrelated development, members of the Council of Teachers Association today held a sit-in at Tombisana High School, Khuyathong, in Imphal city against threats by militants demanding contract work of schools, regular pay and better service conditions, among others.
