GUWAHATI: Three staff members of Sainik School, Niglok, in Arunachal Pradesh’s East Siang district have been arrested in connection with the death of a 12-year-old cadet on the school campus.
The arrested individuals are house masters Devendra Singh from Uttar Pradesh, Kangge Darin from Arunachal Pradesh, and hostel superintendent Amar Singh Thakur from Himachal Pradesh. Earlier, a case was registered under relevant sections of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita.
Superintendent of Police Pankaj Lamba said in a statement that the arrests followed a detailed investigation involving the examination of available evidence, witness statements, and analysis of the sequence of events leading to the incident.
Calling it a “very sensitive case”, police stated that lapses were found on the part of the school management. Eight students, all minors, had earlier been arrested in connection with the case.
Two days ago, the sister of the deceased alleged that he had been bullied and tortured by senior students.
In a video message, Miss Arunachal 2024, Tadu Lunia, said the school authorities informed her family on 1 November that her brother was missing during his morning physical training session and that his body was later found a few hundred metres away.
She said it was initially assumed that he had taken his own life by jumping from an overhead water tank.
“When our family went to collect his belongings, his classmates and dormmates told us that on the night of 31 October, a group of 11 senior students – eight from Class 10 and three from Class 8 – entered the Class 7 dormitory and ragged everyone there,” Lunia said.
“Apart from my brother, they asked all the other students to cover their heads with blankets. My brother was taken alone to the Class 10 dormitory. We don’t know what happened behind closed doors,” she added.
Quoting her brother’s dormmates, she alleged that he had been prevented from sleeping and was mentally and physically harassed in the Class 10 dormitory.
“Some said he was forced to write that he was a thief because he had taken some books from seniors without permission. The investigating officer showed us a short CCTV clip in which my brother appeared to be moving restlessly that morning, clearly showing how stressed and disturbed he was,” Lunia said.
He was also seen entering a classroom and writing a note. His last words were, "Seniors tortured me a lot, and I don’t know what I will do now,’” she added.
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