Students and guardians protest outside the Malda school gates. Picture by Surajit Roy

Malda, May 13: Peeved at the principal for not promoting their wards to Class X, a mob of 100 guardians today gheraoed and locked up the headmistress and seven teachers of Kanya Shikshalaya Girls? High School here.

The teachers of a school in Nadia, a few hundred kilometres away, met with much the same fate yesterday as over 100 students laid siege to the headmistress?s room.

The demands were the same: promotion to Class X. The excuse for taking the school heads and teachers hostage same, too: the children will have to study a new Madhyamik course, to be introduced in Class IX this year.

As the annual results came out last Friday, 65 students from both sections of Class IX at the Malda school found they had not been promoted. Another 14 were also expelled for cheating during the exams.

Even as attempts made by aggrieved parents to convince school headmistress Karabi Nandi to allow the promotions continued throughout the week, the latter refused to give in. This is what spurred the guardians to resort to an agitation under the banner of the AIPSU, the students? union of the RSP.

Around 1 pm, a crowd of guardians and students started gathering outside the one-storied school building. An hour later, a group of them stormed into Nandi?s room and gheraoed her.

The teachers, who were called in by the headmistress, were also surrounded by the angry mob, which demanded that the school take back its decision. A school staff member was then asked to inform all classes that the day was over. As surprised students walked out of the campus, the classrooms were locked and so was the main gate. Nandi and the seven teachers remained boxed in along with agitating guardians and students.

?It is surprising that 65 out of 112 students should not pass. We demand that they show us their answer scripts. There must be some error on the part of the authorities,? yelled a parent, while another cited cases in other schools where promotions had been granted on compassionate grounds.

The students claimed that if they repeated the year, they would have to study a new syllabus.

Around 5 pm, the Englishbazar police were called in to intervene. But with district superintendent of police Sashikant Pujari leaving strict instructions to ?maintain peace as it was a students? issue?, nothing much was done to stop the chaos.

The protests, however, did not sway Nandi?s decision. ?We tried to be as lenient as possible. Though the pass mark was fixed at 272 (out of 800), we promoted some of them who scored 250. But there were some who scored 2, 5 or 4 in each subject and we could not possibly promote them,? she said firmly.

Asked whether the expelled students would be let off, she said: ?I have told them, we shall not give in to such unjust demands.?

In Nadia, the students of Purba Jagadanandapur High School at Bethuadahari withdrew their agitation following an assurance from managing committee secretary Anil Kundu late last evening.

?We are trying to evolve a way to help them. We will evaluate their papers again and see if some extra marks can be awarded to them,? he said.