Father Leo D’Souza, the hostel manager of a residential missionary school in southeastern Madhya Pradesh’s Dindori district, was arrested for allegedly sexually assaulting a 13-year-old student.
The headmaster was charged with legal provisions in the 2012 law to protect children from sexual offences.
The assault happened at Amar Jyoti School in Amarpur village, about 440km from Bhopal.
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The warden allegedly summoned the Class 8 boy from his hostel room on July 9 and tried to rape him before he managed to escape, police said.
“The boy told his parents about the assault and they informed us about it. We arrested Leo D’Souza from Jabalpur on Monday night,” said Sanjay Sonwani, in-charge of Amarpur police outpost.
He is charged with legal provisions in the 2012 law to protect children from sexual offences, called POCSO. A person found guilty can be jailed for five years.
Dindori police superintendent Simala Prasad said school authorities and students were being questioned to find out if the 50-year-old man had committed similar acts before.
Neeraj Santoshi is the Chief of Bureau for Hindustan Times in Uttarakhand, where he leads the state reporting team while covering government, politics, environment, wildlife, Uttarakhand High Court, and issues shaping the Himalayan region. With more than two decades in journalism across conflict zones, he has covered politically sensitive regions and environmentally fragile landscapes, and focused on stories that combine public interest with in-depth storytelling. An alumnus of Pune University with a Master’s in Communication Studies, he has reported extensively from Jammu & Kashmir (2003-2010), Madhya Pradesh (2010 to 2018 ) and Uttarakhand (Since 2018), covering subjects ranging from insurgency, elections and governance to wildlife conservation, mining, climate change, agriculture, human rights and social justice. He has covered politics and legislative assemblies of both Jammu & Kashmir and Madhya Pradesh over more than a decade. Before taking over as Chief of Bureau in Uttarakhand, he served as Special Correspondent with Hindustan Times in Madhya Pradesh and earlier reported for both Hindustan Times and The Indian Express in Jammu & Kashmir, where he covered state politics, environment and insurgency-related developments. Over the years, his stories have focused on environmental degradation, wildlife, illegal mining, governance and the changing social fabric of Himalayan states and Central India. He is particularly interested in long-form explanatory journalism, and stories that explore the intersection of ecology, conservation, governance and society. Outside the newsroom, Neeraj enjoys reading widely on neuroscience, consciousness studies, Artificial Intelligence and quantum physics, with a special interest in Kashmiri Tantric Shaivist traditions. He is also passionate about wildlife, mountaineering and the Himalayas, interests that continue to inform his reporting and deepen his understanding of the region he covers.
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