Thrissur: The owner of a private school in Kerala’s Thrissur district has come under fire after telling students who skipped the Independence Day celebrations to “go to Pakistan” and saying they were “unworthy of living in India.”
Raju Davis, proprietor of Dr Raju Davis International and Sainik School in Mala, reportedly sent a voice note in a parents’ WhatsApp group on August 15 after the school’s Independence Day function, saying absence from the event was “unbearable” and “very wrong.” “When celebrating a country’s Independence Day, staying at home in defiance of it is very wrong. Such people should go and live in some other country, like Pakistan. They do not deserve to live here,” he said in the message, according to media reports.
The school management had earlier informed students that attendance at the Independence Day celebrations was compulsory. In the voice note, Davis allegedly warned that absentees would be barred from entering their classrooms unless parents came to the school and gave a formal explanation, adding that such behaviour was among the reasons children grow up to be disrespectful.
The remark triggered immediate backlash, with parents questioning the logic of equating absence from a school event with lack of patriotism. The Students Federation of India (SFI) Mala area committee organised a protest march to the school demanding action against the management. Reports said Fayis AH, president of the Fraternity Movement in Thrissur, has filed a police complaint against Davis.
Despite the criticism, Davis issued a clarification saying he stood by his words. “I didn’t say go to Bangladesh, Arab countries or Sudan. I said Pakistan because of my patriotism. Because Pakistan is an enemy country for India. I am not thinking it’s wrong, because I never made any communal remarks,” he told Media One.
He later clarified that students would be barred from attending only one period, during which the school would conduct a special lesson on Indian independence for those who missed the celebrations.