Bus Conductor Arrested For Sexual Assault Attempt, Murder Of 7-Year-Old Boy 

Gurgaon: In a gruesome act, a seven-year-old boy who was found with his throat slit and lying in a pool of blood in a washroom of Ryan International School here was allegedly killed by a bus conductor who also tried to sexually abuse the minor. The police cracked the case hours after the heinous act and arrested one Ashok Kumar, one of the school's bus conductors.

The boy's father, Varun Thakur, who works as a quality manager with a private firm in Gurgaon, accused the school administration of negligence. The death triggered outrage, with hundreds of parents and locals gathering outside the private school and protesting against the school management. Two people were arrested for vandalising school property.

The police said some students found the boy in the washroom in the school building in the Sohna area at around 8.30 am. "The students alerted the teachers and the school management then informed the police, who rushed him to Artemis Hospital. He was declared brought dead by doctors," Ravinder Kumar, PRO Gurgaon Police, said. DCP crime Sumit Kuhar said they zeroed in on the accused after two students saw him walking down a corridor.

The police said he then went to the washroom, and then waited there, intending to commit sodomy on any student who walked in. But the boy resisted his attempts with full force and when the accused failed to sodomise him, he slit his throat and right ear. The police claimed he later washed his hands and walked out of the washroom, leaving the knife behind. He also tried to help the teachers when the boy was being taken to the hospital.

School head Neerja Batra said she had come out of the morning assembly prayers when she saw a teacher running followed by two more teachers.

"The child was in a pool of blood. We did not wait for a second and put the child in my vehicle and I sent them to the hospital," she said. "He had suffered critical injuries and was immediately rushed to the hospital by the school head. Despite all attempts, unfortunately his life couldn't be saved," she said, adding that the school was cooperating with the police.

In 2016, the body of a six-year-old student of the school's Vasant Kunj branch in south Delhi was found in a water tank. The principal and a teacher were booked for negligence in May this year. The brutal murder in the upmarket Gurgaon school evoked widespread horror, prompting the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights to visit the school and the hospital where the child was taken.

The apex body for child rights recommended that a case of negligence be registered against the management of the school. A police team, including forensic experts, had earlier collected blood samples and fingerprints from the washroom and tested the blood stained knife that had been recovered from the spot. The body has been sent for a postmortem, the police said.