Patna, March 14: Members of the Opposition and treasury benches today slammed the Gopalganj jail superintendent for not allowing Kedar Nath Pandey, a senior member of the Upper House, meet the principal who allegedly slapped a district magistrate during exam invigilation last week.

The members wanted a thorough probe by a joint committee of both the Houses into the incident.

Raising the issue after the Zero Hour, CPI member Pandey informed the House that he had gone to meet Madhuprabha Devi, the principal of Mahendra Mahila College, on March 12 at the jail to get to the truth of the matter. Pandey added that he was not allowed to meet the principal. The jail authorities told Pandey that he could meet Das only after seven days since one person had already met her on March 11.

“The principal was handcuffed. This is not the proper way to treat a teacher. I inquired with the some of the students, who were present when the incident occurred, and they said there was only one issue whether or not male constables should frisk girl students at the examination centre. On the direction of the district magistrate, constables thrashed the principal and another teacher Manish Kumar badly. The situation is similar to that of the British raj,” Pandey said.

Senior member of the Congress Arun Kumar, BJP’s Narendra Singh, RJD’s Nawal Kishore Yadav and CPM’s Vasudeo Singh demanded a joint committee to probe into the matter.

Chairman of the Legislative Council Tarakant Jha said: “I have asked the deputy chief minister to get a probe conducted by a senior officer. Passing any other order will not be correct at this juncture.”

Devi was sent to jail on March 10 for allegedly clouting the district magistrate who conducted a surprise check at an examination centre and allegedly found that examinees openly resorting to unfair means.