Has Delhi Police verified the staff at your child’s school?

India Today: New Delhi: Sunday, July 15, 2018.

When the body of seven-year-old Pradyuman Thakur was found in a pool of blood near a washroom in his Gurugram school in September last year, suspicion fell on a bus conductor.

The investigation proved him innocent and a senior student was arrested, but the eye-popping media coverage of the incident brought the issue of school safety in the country under the lens. Turns out, there is cause for parents to worry.

An RTI response has revealed that Delhi Police have not maintained any data on verification of school staff including drivers and conductors

for the last five years.

The department also said that only around 30 per cent of schools got police verification done. The revelations came after a parent, Vipin Yadav, filed an RTI application, seeking details on police verification of staff at a private school in Pashchim Vihar.

Yadav was told in reply that Delhi Police had destroyed the data in 2014 and since then no police verification of any staff was done. On further investigation, Mail Today learnt that the data on police verification was removed from the online system on regular intervals.

The Delhi Police server does not allow storage of data for a very long period and so data has to be deleted on regular intervals, said an official of the special branch, which carries out the verifications.

Additional DCP (outer district) Rajender Singh Sagar told Mail Today, It has been observed that only around 25 to 30 per cent private schools approach Delhi Police for verification of their staff.

Remaining 70 per cent schools have been operating without obtaining police clearance certificate for their staff. For safety of children, it is crucial to ascertain the antecedents of school staff. In many cases of violence against children, involvement of school drivers and conductors have been found.

According to guidelines issued by the directorate of education of the Delhi government, it is mandatory for schools to get verification of their administrative and other support staff done on regular basis.

Following verification, they are given clearance certificate by the Delhi Police. Delhi Police has a specialised unit for carrying out such verifications but it is the duty of the school management to provide us with the list of their employees.

The verification is done online, said Anil Mittal, additional PRO of Delhi Police. The guidelines were framed after Pradyumans murder. In November last year, the government had issued the 117-point code, detailing the steps that must be taken by schools to ensure safety of children within their premises.

Vipin Yadav, the RTI applicant, told Mail Today, When I visited the school, I found that there was no security and the staff too seemed impolite, giving the parents a sense that indecent beings are lurking around in the school premises.

In June this year, Yadav had filed the RTI plea, asking, From 2011-2018, how many times have the Delhi Police received request for verification of the teaching as well as non teaching staff at school?"

A senior police officer, who has been part of the verification drive in the outer district, requesting anonymity, said, The onus of getting the verification of the teaching as well as non-teaching staff solely lies with the school management. We have observed that while 30 per cent schools get the verification process completed, around 70 per cent schools do not get it done, citing reasons like students not using their school bus etc.

Speaking to Mail Today, principal of Springdales School, Pusa Road, Ameeta Mulla Wattal, said, Keeping in mind the safety of children, our school makes sure that the verification process is done in a proper manner. For that, we outsource the process to an agency which gets the police verification done.

Ashok Pandey, principal of Ahlcon Public School, said, The process is a little cumbersome but we ensure that the verification is done regularly. For this, the Delhi Police cooperates with us.

Apart from issuing the police clearing certificate, the verification is done free for the group D employees.