Minor pushed into fire, upper caste students booked in TN

CHENNAI: In a gruesome incident of caste-related violence in Tamil Nadu, three upper caste juvenile students were booked by Tindivanam police for assaulting and pushing into an 11-year-old boy fire.

The boy, who was pushed into the bush fire allegedly by the theee students, suffered serious burn injuries on his body.

Police have booked the three juveniles under Scheduled Caste, Scheduled Tribe Atrocities Act.

Police said that the boy, who is a class 6 student of the Kttuchiviri government school, was regularly insulted using casteist slur by the upper caste boys of the same school.

On Monday evening while the boy had gone to his relatives place, the upper caste students saw him and insulted him and later pushed him into a bush which had caught fire.

The boy who suffered burn injuries jumped into a nearby water tank.

After returning home, the parents of the boy were shocked to find him with burn injuries and when asked, he told them that he had accidentally fallen in the bush that had caught fire.

However when doctors at Tindivanam government hospital questioned him, the boy narrated the incident and also informed that upper caste boys used to regularly insult him.

The father of the boy complained to the Tindivanam police which registered a case under Section 324 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and SC/ST atrocities Act.