Headmaster arrested for ‘raping, impregnating’ class 9 student in Odisha

The headmaster, who is already married, had allegedly assured the girl’s father that he would marry her.

In another case of unwanted teenage pregnancy, police in southern Odisha’s Koraput on Sunday detained a 45-year-old headmaster of a tribal school over allegations of raping a Class 9 girl found to be pregnant by five months .

Since 2015, there has been a spate of such pregnancies among tribal girls residing in school hostels across the state. (File)

Police said the father of the girl, a student in Balda area of the district’s Nandapur block, lodged a complaint with Padwa police station alleging that the headmaster, Bidhubhushan Nayak, forced her to have physical relationship with him.

Padwa inspector-in-charge KC Sethi said prima facie the headmaster seems to be responsible. The headmaster, who is already married, had allegedly assured the girl’s father that he would marry her.

Though the headmaster is yet to be arrested, officials said he might be arrested by Monday morning under various sections of Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act and Indian Penal Code.

The latest incident of teenage pregnancy has come three months after a cook working in a residential school in tribal-dominated Malkangiri was arrested on allegations of impregnating a 11-year-old girl.

In February 2015, a Class VI girl student in a Koraput-based residential school for SC/ST students, delivered a baby in the school hostel while in August last year, a 15-year-old girl student of a government girls high school in Ganjam gave birth to a stillborn in the classroom.

In 2015 more than 20 cases of teen pregnancies were reported from tribal schools across the state.