NCPCR to probe rape case of 8-year-old girl in Punjab's Beas

Union Minister Harsimrat Kaur Badal on Thursday said the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) has constituted a team to probe the rape of an eight-year-old girl at a private school in Beas near Amritsar.

The minister for food processing said a NCPCR team would visit the school soon "to fix responsibility for lapses by the school management, besides ensuring the safety of students in future".

"It is shocking that despite four days having passed, no action had been initiated against the school management for trying to cover up the gruesome crime nor against police officers who had assisted the management in this in-human task," the Shiromani Akali Dal MP from Bathinda said in a statement here.

The minor girl was allegedly raped by a 15-year-old boy inside the school last week, following which he was booked and taken into custody, police said on Monday.

The Union minister said she approached NCPCR Chairman Priyank Kanoongo on Thursday to ensure that a fair inquiry could be initiated against the school management "which has tried to hush-up the crime..".

She said she appraised the NCPCR head about the alleged non-cooperative attitude of the school management which did not even provide CCTV footage to the parents of the victim.

"The NCPCR chairman has assured me that it will hold a thorough inquiry into the incident and recommend strict action against all those responsible for impinging of the rights of the victim," Badal further said.

She also requested Chief Minister Amarinder Singh to take stern action against the principal of the school as well as police officers who had "failed to do their duty and even tried to pressure the victim's family not to go ahead with the complaint."