Staff Reporter :
The High Court (HC) on Tuesday formed a committee headed by Additional Secretary of the Ministry of Education to formulate a national policy for determining the method of preventing students from committing suicide.
The court asked the committee to submit a report in the court by a month on their progress in this regard amid a tense situation over the suicide of a student of Viqarunnisa Noon School and College at their Shantinagar residence in the city on Monday after allegedly being rebuked by teachers for using mobile phone during examination and insulting her parents over the matter. The committee also asked to submit an investigation report in the court by the same time after conducting a probe into the incident of suicide of the student named Aritree Adhikari, 15.
The five-member committee will also include an officer not below the rank of Deputy Secretary from the Ministry of Social Welfare, an Educationist, a Psychologist and a Lawyer.
The High Court bench of Justice Sheikh Hassan Arif and Justice Razik-Al Jalil passed the Suo Moto order when four Supreme Court lawyers brought the issue to their notice.
The lawyers are— Barrister Aneek R Haque, Barrister Jyotirmoy Barua, Advocate Aynunnahar Siddiqa and Advocate Jasmine Sultana.
After the court’s order, Barrister Aneek R Haque said, “The court formed a committee headed by Additional Secretary of the Ministry of Education to formulate a national policy determining the method of preventing students from suicide.”
The court also issued a rule on the matter. The court wanted to know in the rule as to why the government should not be directed to formulate a national policy determining the method of preventing such kind of suicide.
During hearing, the High Court observed that the suicide by a student of Viqarunnisa Noon School was heart-rending and termed the insulting of her parents a ‘very bad example’.
Aritree Adhikari, 15, daughter of Dilip Adhikari, and a Class-IX student of Viqarunnisa Noon School and College, committed suicide at their Shantinagar residence in the city on Monday.
Authorities of Viqarunnisa Noon School and College have asked its morning shift-in-charge Zinnat Ara to refrain from duties amid a strong public anger over the incident. The authorities of the institution issued a show-cause notice against Zinnat Ara, and ordered her to refrain from duties.
