India School Girls Attacked For Protesting Verbal Harrassment

Thirty-six schoolgirls in a remote town in India have been treated in hospital after they were attacked by a large crowd of teenage boys and their parents when they complained of sexual harassment.

Six boys and one woman were arrested in the north-eastern state of Bihar after the attack, which took place at the girls’ boarding school.

The girls-- ranging from 10 to 14 years old-- had been playing in a sports area on Saturday night at their school in Triveniganj  when a group of teenage boys began making lewd comments towards them.  The girls argued back with the boys, who initially backed off.  20 minutes later, however, a group of the boys and some parents returned,  carrying bamboo sticks and iron rods.

“They dragged us by our ponytails, assaulted us with bamboo sticks and kicked and punched,” said Gudia, one of 36 girls who were treated in the hospital after the attack.  “We were totally unarmed and had nothing to protect us. I saw many of my friends lying on the ground and crying with pain.”

“They had been always teasing us and scribbling dirty words on the walls of our school,” Gudia added, saying that she and other girls had tried to report the harassment to local government officials but were not taken seriously.

Police have arrested nine suspects.  Most of the injured children were discharged from the hospital and returned to the school  A local official said many of the girls were shaken and feared further violence.

“Apparently, they are suffering from psychological fear, but we are arranging entertaining movies on the campus to calm down their tension and dispel any such fear from their minds,” said district magistrate Baidyanath Yadav.  “We are also counseling them so that they could get better soon.”

Yadav said police were being deployed and that a higher fence would be put up around the school to prevent outsiders from entering the campus.



Sexual violence has become a major political issue in Bihar, one of India’s poorest states, after an audit of 110 women’s care homes found varying reports of abuse.



India as a whole has been reckoning with sexual assault since a 2012 gang-rape and murder that galvanised women’s movements and led to an overhaul of rape laws. Activists say attitudes are slowly changing, particularly in large cities, but that conditions are generally worse for women in remote and rural areas.