Common people of Ratua in Malda district, along with teachers of the Ratua High School, are all set to block the state highway in front of the block development office on Tuesday morning. They will be demanding the arrest of the headmaster of the school against whom an FIR has been filed by the BDO concerned in November under charges of irregularities.

The school has been in a stalemate ever since the FIR, as neither someone has replaced the headmaster, Krishna Chandra Mandal, as teacher-in-charge, nor has he attended school almost for the past 90 days. Students of the school have also been deprived of the midday meal, uniforms etc, it is learnt.

It may be noted that some teachers and locals alleged that Mr Mandal had misappropriated a huge sum of money from the school in the last 12 years, amounting to almost a crore of rupees. An enquiry committee of three members, including the BDO Ratua-I, DI of schools (secondary) and DPO, was formed and on the basis their report, BDO Arjun Pal filed an FIR at the Ratua police station against the headmaster.

It is now alleged by the locals that Mr Mandal has been absent from the school and no teacher has taken charge to run the school. “We are facing great problems in carrying out the daily activities of the institution.

The midday meal was also stopped and the students were given results signed by a senior teacher for their promotion to the next class. No initiative has been taken for this high school that has almost 3000 students,” Saroj Kumar Misra, a teacher of the school, said.

Some other teachers added that they failed to understand how the school will be managed in the current academic session under these circumstances, while their proposal to select a teacher-incharge was also turned down by the officer concerned.

It is also alleged by some locals that the police had intentionally restrained themselves from arresting the headmaster and that the administration had been trying to shield him. Sub-Divisional Police Officer, Chanchal, Sajalkanti Biswas, however, refuted this allegation. “An investigation in the matter is going on and everything has been done according to the law and according to the guidelines from the Supreme Court,” Mr Biswas said.