After govt order, cops have to verify 2L school employees in 15 days
NEWDELHI: The murder of a class 2 student inside Gurgaon’s Ryan International School followed a day later by the rape of a fiveyear-old girl in a Delhi private school prompted the Delhi government on September 11 to issue mandatory direction to all city schools to submit a record of their staff members within a week to get them verified by the local police stations. Though the state government said the clearance certificates should be handed within 15 days, it will take months for the Delhi Police to check the antecedents of all the employees.
While the Special Branch, which issues clearance certificates, had in 2016 verified around 75,000 character verification reports (CVR) throughout the year, they will have to look into records of more than two lakh school employees within 15 days this time, if all school employees submit their details in time.
On their website, the Delhi police have ‘special verification for schools’ in which school employees will have to key-in their details and upload their identification identity cards. Police will then verify the ID cards, submitted by each employee and issue a clearance certificate over the mail.
For Delhi residents, officers from Special Branch visit the local address and check the claims made by employees, while for outstation employees, the forms are sent to the police station in their hometowns.
The problem is there are 5,796 schools across the city, which include private, municipal, state and central government schools. According to the government order, every school employee — from a teacher to a bus driver and a peon to a conductor — has to apply for police clearance certificate. On an average if there are 40 employees in each school, the number of employees to be verified will cross over two lakh. Most Delhi schools have around 60 to 400 employees.
A prominent south Delhi school, with hostel facilities, said they have over 400 employees. A principal of a west Delhi school, “Our school has around 2,500 students and there are around 150 employees, which include teachers and non-teaching staff. Nonteaching staff includes all employees from office to a gardener. The verification for all the employees is in process.”
Delhi police spokesperson Madhur Verma said, “There is nothing to worry about. Delhi police verifies thousands of pass- port verifications every year. Our force has the adequate resources and paraphernalia to verify every employee and check their antecedents.”
The murder by a bus conductor and rape by a peon exposed how unsafe students are in schools where unverified employees work. Following the minor’s rape on September 9, Delhi police commissioner directed DCPS to get the security and safety audit done of the schools under their jurisdiction. “The schools have to install CCTV cameras at all vulnerable points, get police verification done of every employee and hire staff only from authorised agencies,” said a police spokesperson.
The security audit would involve checking if there is any time when the children are left unattended, whether they are handed over to their parents under supervision and the list of areas the children and teachers have access to.