NEW DELHI – A second grader was found dead outside an Indian school toilet with his throat slit, sparking outrage among parents who scuffled with police in Guragaon on Saturday.
On Friday morning, the eight-year-old boy was found crawling and bleeding profusely in the bathroom of the Ryan International school in Gurgaon, a city just southwest of New Delhi in northern India.
Police said that the boy was attacked with a knife after resisting a sexual attack allegedly by a bus attendant at the school.
The suspect was arrested the same day in connection with the murder, according to Hindustan Times. Simardeep Singh, Guragaon deputy commissioner of police, said the accused, identified as Ashok Kumar, confessed to the crime during questioning.
“The boy resisted the sexual assault and the attacker decided to kill him to cover up the crime,” Singh said.
Kumar had been working at the school for eight months.
Ranked among the top private educational institutions in the country, Ryan International runs nearly 150 schools across India and in the United Arab Emirates.
Last year, a six-year-old student was found dead in a water tank at its New Delhi establishment. Police had arrested the principal, a teacher and three other staff members for negligence in that case.
The victim’s sister studies in Class 5 in the same school.
The incident sparked protests by parents, two of who were arrested for vandalizing the school property. Several others held a sit-in protest at the police commissioner’s office.
Gurgaon: Agitated parents vandalised Ryan international school where 8-yr-old student was killed in a toilet@htTweets @htdelhi pic.twitter.com/r9iZVT6XZ1
— HT Gurgaon (@HTGurgaon) September 8, 2017
Parents of the nearly 1,000 students at the school tried to storm the campus on Saturday to demand the arrest of school managers over the case. But hundreds of police in riot gear guarded the building to avoid a repeat of violence on Friday when chairs and cupboards were smashed.
The father of the boy, who works as a quality manager in a Gurgaon-based private company, said his son was killed either by a school staff or a senior student.
The school has suspended the principal and assured cooperation with the investigators.
Authorities said that they had launched an investigation into security at the school.
