Supreme Court seeks response from UP government on plea seeking action against teacher who asked students to slap Muslim classmate

The Supreme Court on Wednesday sought the response of the Uttar Pradesh government to a petition seeking action against the Muzaffarnagar school teacher who is alleged to have goaded students into slapping a Muslim classmate as punishment. [Tushar Gandhi vs State of Uttar Pradesh and ors].A bench of Justices Abhay S Oka and Pankaj Mithal also issued notice to the Central government, the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE), and the Council for the Indian School Certificate Examination, returnable on September 25.The district Superintendent of Police was directed to file a report on the steps taken so far in the probe into the matter, as well as steps taken to protect the victim-child and his parents..The bench was hearing a petition filed by the great-grandson of Mahatma Gandhi, Tushar Gandhi.The plea sought a time-bound and independent probe into the case, as well as remedial and preventive actions to be taken by schools to tackle violence against children, including those belonging to religious minorities.The petitioner also urged the Court to direct the State police to ensure that a criminal case is registered by invoking all applicable criminal law provisions and not just for "relatively innocuous" offences, as well as "to take all consequent actions, including arrest of the school teacher.".The private school school in question in the district's Khubbapur village, has since been sealed. The teacher at the center of the controversy, Tripta Tyagi, is said to have referred to the boy’s faith and spoken pejoratively about Muslim children, while asking his classmates to beat him hard.The video of the incident went viral on social media.The National Commission for Protection of Child Rights recently asked the Uttar Pradesh Police to lodge a first information report (FIR) against her. The child rights body had also sought responses from the concerned District Magistrate and Superintendent of Police.The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) had also taken suo motu cognisance of the incident, and sought the response of the State of Uttar Pradesh and the Director General of Police of the State..Tyagi has been booked under Sections 323 (causing hurt) and 504 (intentional insult with intent to provoke breach of peace) of the Indian Penal Code, as per the Indian Express.She has, however, not been arrested yet.Meanwhile, Tyagi released a video statement asserting that while she may have made a mistake, there is no communal angle to the incident..The petition before the top court has been filed through advocate Shadan Farasat and drawn by advocate Mreganka Kukreja..[Read order]