The Karnataka Police Monday solved the case of pesticide contamination in a school’s water tank in the Shivamogga district, identifying an 11-year-old boy, a Class 5 student from the same school, as the culprit. He has been sent to a juvenile correctional home.
According to police sources, the incident occurred on July 31 when the cook at the government lower primary school at Hoovinakone, Deepa, discovered that the drinking water had turned discoloured and emitted a foul odour. She promptly informed the school teachers and the School Development and Monitoring Committee (SDMC).
The school authorities later filed a case with the Hosanagar police to investigate the matter. The incident also caught the attention of Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, who called it an “act of terror”.
The police solved the mystery after questioning several students. According to a police officer, the Class 5 student was recently made the class leader, but he felt upset that his classmates were not following his instructions. Around 15 days ago, a Class 2 student of the same school had accidentally mixed phenol into a classmate’s drinking water bottle, which had also come to the authorities’ attention.
The Class 5 student, taking a cue from this incident, decided to mix pesticides into the school’s water tank to vent out his frustration, the officer said. The boy brought a pesticide, generally used for ginger crop protection, from his home and poured it into the school water tank around 9 am on July 31 before the classes started, the officer added.
“Some of the students witnessed this, and the boy threatened them with consequences if they spoke about it to anyone. The students at the school were counselled, and they told us about what they had seen. We are investigating whether the boy acted on someone else’s instructions,” said the officer.
This was the second incident in the last month where water tanks in Karnataka schools were poisoned. On July 14, in the Belagavi district, a government school’s water tank was poisoned in an alleged attempt to remove its headmaster, who belonged to a minority faith, from his position. This incident resulted in the arrest of three people, including a local leader connected to the right-wing group Sri Ram Sene.