The Chandigarh administration had ordered an inquiry into the school's role in the expulsion of Ruchika Girhotra.
The school of Ruchika Girhotra, the 14-year-old molested by a former Haryana top cop in 1990, never imposed a penalty on her for non-payment of fee before her expulsion.
"There is nothing on record to show that any penalty was ever imposed on late Ruchika on account of non-payment of fees," says the inquiry report of Prerna Puri, sub-divisional magistrate East (Panchkula) as quoted by CBSE in its show-cause notice to the Sacred Heart Convent in Chandigarh.
"In fact, the question on imposition of a penalty would have arisen only had the school accepted late payment of fees from her," said the notice, a copy of which was given in response to an RTI application filed by Mumbai-based activist Ajay Marathe.
The Chandigarh administration had ordered an inquiry into the school's role in the expulsion of Ruchika which was conducted by Puri.
A Panchkula court had in December last year convicted former Haryana DGP SPS Rathore of molesting Ruchika, then a budding tennis player.
The girl committed suicide three years after the incident and her family claims that their alleged harassment by Rathore led her to take the step.
The inquiry report slammed the then school administration for "selectively" expelling Ruchika without taking into account her "larger academic and future interest".
"Instead of taking into account the larger academic and future interest of Ruchika Girhotra (like the school did in all the around 135 cases of other similarly placed students who did not pay their fee) she was selectively expelled from the school," the report said.
Sister Sebastina was the principal when Ruchika was expelled from school in September 1990, a month after she was molested by Rathore on August 12, 1990. The school had claimed that Ruchika defaulted in paying the fee and expelled her.
"It seems highly implausible that no other case of non-payment of fees by the student was brought to the notice of Sister Sebastina during her tenure as Principal".
"It is rather strange that a missionary school which claims to empathetically consider the cases of those students who are unable to pay the fees in time on account of financial/family hardships, ignored its own principle by making an unprecedented exception in the case of Ruchika Girhotra," the inquiry report said.
Puri also stated in her findings that in the case of Ruchika, the school evoked the Pupils Code of Conduct arbitrarily and the same rule has never been applied to any of the 135 similar cases on its official record.
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
)
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
)
)
)
)
)
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}