Grandmother alleges excessive flogging at Black Bush Primary
A GRANDMOTHER, at the recent consultations on corporal punishment in Berbice, complained to Education Minister Priya Manickhand about an act of excessive flogging by a teacher at Mibicuri Primary School, Black Bush Polder, Corentyne. The incident is currently being investigated by the Department of Education and Probation and Social Services in Berbice.
Ramdia Bhowan, while agreeing that corporal punishment should be maintained in school, warned against the excessiveness of lashes by teachers.
Speaking at the forum in the New Amsterdam Multilateral School, the aggrieved woman lamented that her six-year-old grandson returned home last Thursday with several swellings on his feet and, on enquiring how he suffered the injuries, he told her he was running in the school corridor when a broken board fell and a Grade One teacher left her class, armed with a large wooden ruler that she used to give him several lashes.
“These young teachers are brutalising children. Whipping is good, but not brutalizing,” Bhowan declared.
The boy’s mother, Hermilla Shirkissoon, speaking to the Guyana Chronicle afterwards, said the following morning she accompanied her son, Mahendra Bhowan, to the Headmistress and made an initial report.
She was, subsequently, advised to make another report to the Department of Education.
Consequently, she visited the nearby home of Regional Education Officer, Shafiran Bhajan and, according to Bhowan, she followed instructions to go to the Mibicuri Police Station and then Mibicuri Hospital, where her son was seen and examined by a doctor who issued a medical certificate.
The document shown to this newspaper revealed that a one-by-three centimetres and two 2-by-2 centimetres swellings were on the left and right calves.