'Teacher accused of molesting students cleared by cops before school transfer'

PARLIAMENT The teacher accused of molesting students in a Hulu Selangor Tamil school was only transferred to another school after police found there was no case.

Education Minister Mahdzir Khalid said the teacher had first been transferred to a district education office (PPD) while the case was under investigation.

“In this case, the police said there was no case so we released him (to another school).

“(The current standard operating procedure) is to transfer suspected teachers to PPDs, separated from students,” Mahdzir told reporters when met at the Parliament lobby today.

He added that if there was a case, the teacher would have been kept at the PPD until a court ruling was made.

He was clarifying on the Hulu Selangor case, which sparked outrage when it was revealed that the teacher, accused of molesting at least nine girls, was transferred to another school.

However, his comments today were different from his response in a written parliamentary reply on Oct 28, where he first said that the teacher was transferred to another school.

He had said then that the ministry would cooperate with the police to solve the case.

He had in that written reply also said that current procedures dealing with such cases was to transfer teachers suspected of molesting students to other school districts, and to place them under the observation of Education Department counsellors.

There will also be counseling for the affected students, followed by disciplinary action against the accused teachers once a court ruling has been made, he had said.

In May, it was reported that a teacher at a Tamil primary school in Hulu Selangor had been acting inappropriately with girls studying there.

One of his alleged victims complained to the headmaster, who then informed the state Education Department.- Mkini