Vairamuthu, 16, a class X student of Karapettai Boys Higher Secondary School, was hospitalised after he his teacher caned him on Thursday.
Speaking to the media, Kandasamy, father of Vairamuthu, from Thermal Nagar, said his son had special class on Wednesday to prepare for the Mathematics exam on Friday, and in the afternoon when his son was playing with his friend, his mathematics teacher, Kaniraj came into the class and started beating Vairamuthu.
After returning home, Vairamuthu did not tell his parents about the beating and quietly went to sleep. But by night, his body temperature shot up. When the father took off his son’s shirt, he saw the marks of cane on Vairamuthu’s back. Shocked, he took his son to the South Police Station and to register a complaint against the teacher.
The policemen, seeing the boy’s injuries, told Kandasamy to take his son to the hospital immediately. When even after being administered drugs, the fever had not subsided by Thursday morning, Kandasamy took his son to the Thoothukudi GH for further treatment.
At the hospital, Vairamuthu told reporters that he had only casually thrown a blackboard duster at his friend and it did not even hit him. But the teacher, who had just then walked into class, started beating him severely, asking no questions or listening to no amount of explanation from him.
Vairamuthu’s mother Rameshwari said her son had already undergone an Appendicitis operation earlier and she had kept the headmaster informed about his health. Unmindful that Vairamuthu had to write the mathematics board exam on Friday, the teacher had behaved rudely and had beaten him severely, she said.
When contacted, Natarajan, principal of the school, said he had told all the teachers not to resort to corporal punishment, and instead bring erring students to him. He also promised he would inform the management about the issue and that suitable action would be taken against the mathematics teacher.