Palghar: A day after a seven-year-old student died at an ashram school in Maswan village, Palghar district, after developing a fever and 30 others reported similar symptoms, the district administration on Tuesday suspended the school’s superintendent for alleged negligence and set up a special investigation team (SIT).Show-cause notices were also issued to the president and the secretary of Adivasi Seva Mandal, which runs the school, as well as the headmaster.The SIT will probe the circumstances surrounding the child’s death and examine the arrangements made for students’ health, food and safety at the residential school. It will assess whether there were lapses in student care and supervision. “Further action will be taken after the inquiry committee submits its report,” said tribal development project officer Vishal Khatri.The death of Shreyans Abant, a Class 1 student, prompted senior officials, including zilla parishad chief executive officer Manoj Ranade, Khatri, and a deputy commissioner from the tribal development department, to inspect the school.A team from the state Food and Drug Administration (FDA) inspected the school’s food preparation facilities. Samples of spices, turmeric, chilli powder, cooking oil containers and other ingredients used to prepare meals were sent for testing. A water purifier has been installed at the school to ensure safe drinking water for students.Following Shreyans’s death, health authorities had screened other students at the school. Thirty who reported symptoms such as fever and cough were taken to the primary healthcare centre at Maswan. Of them, five were later shifted to the rural hospital at Manor for further treatment.Activists alleged that in many tribal ashram schools, basic sanitation simply does not exist. Students are forced to bathe and relieve themselves in nearby streams and rivulets, where slipping on the banks has caused severe injuries and even fatal drownings, they said. Inside the living quarters, crumbling infrastructure leaves children exposed to venomous snakes, rats, and wild animals entering their rooms, they said. Earlier this month, three students of a Gadchiroli ashram school died following a snakebite. “Living under the constant threat of injury and animal attacks severely isolates these young students and pushes many towards severe depression. Having studied in an ashram school, I have seen firsthand how these harrowing conditions destroy a child’s mental and physical well-being,” said Bhaskar Mhase, state vice-president and district president of Students Federation of India’s Thane and Palghar units.An activist who works in the region said many ashram schools have poor sanitation facilities. “Girls are not given sanitary pads. Water seeps into the dormitories during the monsoon. Besides, there aren’t enough health facilities in the vicinity of schools to treat students. Ashram schools are regular victims of govt apathy.” (With inputs from Mahiyar Patel)
