By Sandeep Rai
Meerut: A Dalit boy from Amroha, 16, was found hanging in the bathroom of a juvenile home in Bulandshahr. He had been sent to the centre on July 30 after being held for “kidnapping” an upper caste girl he had eloped with. Since then, he had been allegedly beaten up by dominant caste inmates for his “transgression” and for “daring to” run away with the upper caste girl, his family said.
“On Monday, around 5pm, I got a call telling me my son had hanged himself. But I am certain he was murdered,” his father said in the complaint, on the basis of which an FIR was lodged against eight persons — five inmates, the girl’s parents and her uncle — for murder, criminal conspiracy and under the SC/ST Act on Tuesday. District probation officer Nagender Pal Singh said a high-level probe has been ordered into the case.
“I had met him two days before that and he said he was in deep pain. He was crying and asking me to get him out because inmates, in collusion with juvenile home staffers, would thrash him brutally,” his father, a hawker, said. “He had told me they broke his rib and he found it difficult to breathe. His hip bone had also been injured. What could I do? I told him I was trying hard to get him out. Now, he’s dead.”
The boy, along with four others, had run away from the home on August 16. “Because he was tortured incessantly,” his father said in the complaint. “On August 18, I submitted a written application to the court to provide him protection.” He also made his son surrender. “The inmates, of a dominant caste, would admonish my son, asking how he could dare to run away with an upper caste girl and hurl caste abuses at him. Whenever I visited, I would request the staffers to help him. But every time we complained, he was beaten up more.”
The boy’s uncle said the case for which he was held was the reason why they believe the girl’s family may have been involved. “Our boy was just 16. So was the girl, who lived with her family on the upper floor of our house in Amroha on rent. They fell in love but the family moved out. The two stayed in touch,” he added. “The girl asked our boy to meet him and take her away. He made the mistake of eloping with her. The girl’s family filed a police complaint and he was held.”
This story first appeared on timesofindia.indiatimes.com