Eight boys escaped from a Korwa residential school near Balrampur district headquarters in Chhattisgarh after removing a loose window grille and scaling the campus boundary wall, prompting the tribal development department to remove the in-charge principal and order a departmental inquiry.
The children reportedly left their hostel room on Thursday night without being detected. According to preliminary information, the grille was already loose and the boys removed it before climbing out one after another. The incident has raised questions about night-time supervision and the condition of security fixtures at the residential school.
Officials said the escape came to light after some of the children allegedly tried to open the shutter of a closed grocery shop in the district headquarters area. The noise alerted local residents, who surrounded the group and caught four of the boys. The children were identified as students of the Korwa residential school.
Four others initially fled in the dark. Two of them were later found at their homes and handed back to the school management, officials said. The supplied report does not specify the current status or location of the remaining children.
The tribal development department treated the incident as a serious supervisory lapse and removed the in-charge principal from the post on Monday. A departmental inquiry has been initiated to establish how the children were able to leave the hostel campus unnoticed and who was responsible for supervising them during the night.
The preliminary account also alleges that neither a hostel superintendent nor a watchman was present when the children escaped. The inquiry is expected to examine the staffing arrangements, the condition of the window grille, the boundary wall and the procedures followed for monitoring students after lights-out.
Residential schools place responsibility for children’s safety on the institution beyond classroom hours, making hostel management and physical security central to their functioning. In this case, the escape involved both a compromised window grille and an alleged absence of night supervisors, though the departmental inquiry will determine the precise sequence of events and accountability.
The department’s next steps will depend on the findings of the inquiry, including its determination of responsibility for night supervision and the circumstances that allowed the students to leave the campus without immediate detection.
