Two days before India celebrated its 76th Independence Day, a nine-year-old Dalit boy from Rajasthan’s Jalore district died at a hospital in Ahmedabad after allegedly being thrashed by his school principal.
The boy, Inder Meghwal, according to initial reports, was punished by Chail Singh, a Rajput, for quenching his thirst from a water pot reserved for the upper caste teacher.
The incident triggered a massive outrage, leading to the immediate arrest of the accused schoolteacher and drawing the national gaze upon Saraswati Vidya Mandir, a private school in Jalore’s Surana village, and the contentious earthen pot. Though the pitcher is nowhere to be found on the school premises, it has stirred the caste pot in Rajasthan.
