Kendrapada: A girl student of Pattamundai College in Odisha’s Kendrapada district ended her life after allegedly being sexually harassed by an invigilator during the Plus II examination.
The matter came to the fore on Saturday after the grieving mother lodged a formal complaint with Pattamundai Rural Police.
According to the complaint, the invigilator took the student to a common room on the pretext of checking for malpractice while she was appearing for the exam on February 19 and allegedly touched her inappropriately.
When the girl resisted, the teacher allegedly threatened to expel her and warned her against disclosing the incident to anyone. Visibly shaken, she returned to the examination hall after 10 minutes but was unable to concentrate on writing the paper.
Upon reaching home, she narrated the ordeal to her mother, who then reported the matter to the college authorities. Though they assured to address the issue after completion of the exams, the girl was found hanging in the house on February 24.
While police had initially registered an unnatural death case, they intensified the investigation after getting the written complaint from the mother of the deceased and collected CCTV footage from the college to verify the allegations.
The IIC Dheeraj Lenka said the footage is being examined as part of the ongoing probe.
