“Everyone is welcome here,” said a colourful poster in the foyer of Global Public School (GPS) in Thiruvaniyoor in the eastern suburb of Kochi. Next to it was a framed copy of the Preamble of the Constitution of India.
It was only two weeks since the school, situated in a sprawling hill-top campus, received the tragic news of a student’s death. The body of Mihir Ahammed (15), a Class 9 student of GPS was found on the truss work attached to the level three of a highrise apartment, on the evening of January 15.
Media reports said he took his own life after returning from school. Only his sister was at home when the incident happened. It was in November 2024 that Mihir moved to GPS from GEMS Modern Academy, his school of six years. The mid-year school shift happened after he allegedly faced harassment while at GEMS from school authorities.
As Mihir’s family tried to come to terms with the grief and shock, his mother Rajna PM wrote to Binu Azeez, Vice-Principal of GEMS Modern Academy, listing the mental distress her son faced. It blamed the school for their insensitivity towards a 15-year-old.
Rajna was in the dark about what happened at GPS until they were approached by Mihir’s friends, who showed them screenshots, purportedly from an Instagram group chat. They revealed that Mihir was subjected to physical abuse and bullying. Students from both GPS and GEMS Modern Academy, Mihir’s previous school, were part of the chat group.
The harassment Mihir faced at GPS at the hands of his peers was probably gruesome, the screenshots revealed. The teenager was made to lick a toilet and his face was dunked in the toilet and flush operated, one cut said.
The family then filed a formal complaint with the police. On January 30, Rajna posted another note on her Facebook page, sharing a press statement and the screenshots of chats by schoolmates.
As Mihir’s family tried to make sense of the tragic loss, social media users in Kerala began a ‘Justice for Mihir’ campaign seeking action against those responsible for his death.
On Friday, January 31, TNM spoke to Mihir’s family, school officials, and the police, to understand the circumstances that led to the tragic incident.
Response from his family shows Mihir was under tremendous pressure for many weeks ahead of his tragic death because of the antagonism he faced in schools he studied. He sought transfer to another school hoping for a fresh start. Instead, he encountered hostility from new schoolmates, with neither institution providing support systems that could have protected a vulnerable teenager struggling to find his footing. But both schools tried to paint the picture of Mihir being happy in their responses to parents, though he was broken.
GPS, run by Global Education Trust, has the backing of several business heads, who sit on their board. It offers two syllabus streams in the same campus, a regular CBSE and the Cambridge IGCSE, under the brand GPS-International, of which Mihir was a student.
GPS (CBSE) principal Dilip George told TNM that the school is cooperating with the investigation in every possible way. He said the students are shocked by media reports and that the school’s internal investigation did not find any evidence on allegations of ragging.
Media reports on January 16, however, indicated an altercation between students on the day before Mihir’s death. The Times of India quoted the police as saying, “On Tuesday [January 14] there was a quarrel between his classmates and [Mihir], and some of his classmates sustained minor injuries in the incident. Following this, parents of the students involved in the altercation were called to the school on Wednesday. The boy's stepfather met the school authorities and promised them that such an issue would not arise in the future.”
The report further said that the stepfather’s statement to police mentioned that he had returned to work after the meeting, while the boy left for home by school bus. It also said the stepfather reprimanded Mihir over the phone. Suspecting something was “amiss in the way the boy reacted,” he called home a second time, and the call was answered by Mihir’s sister, who informed the father that he did not want to speak with him. Soon after, the family received news of the mishap, the report quoting police sources said.
School authorities said the footage from the school’s surveillance system showed Mihir happy at school, even on the day of his death. They said that on January 15, he had arrived early for basketball coaching, and stayed back late for revision classes. “He even left his revision note behind. He could be seen waving goodbye to his friends as he left school that afternoon,” they said.
TNM also spoke to Sreedevi NR, the Principal of GPS International. Both Dilip and Sreedevi said the school has a “zero tolerance” policy towards ragging and bullying. When asked to explain the policy, they said, “The first step is to issue a verbal warning. If the bullying is repeated, we document the incident, and if it involves physical assault, then the child’s parents are called.”
The GEMS school officials said Mihir faced disciplinary action for allegedly hitting a girl in his class. “Mihir hit a girl in his class. He said that it was because the girl pinched him. The school has a no-tolerance policy towards any assault, so he was suspended for a week”. Parents of Mihir accepted the suspension as per the school policy, they said.
Mihir’s family alleges that even after the end of the suspension period, Mihir was made to sit in a separate room, and not allowed to interact with his classmates. Rajna’s letter accused vice principal Binu Azeez of having taken extreme steps to ‘discipline’ the 15-year-old.
Rajna, in her letter to the GEMS school Vice-Principal, blamed him for being allegedly hostile to the parents when they met the school authorities following Mihir’s suspension. She wrote, “You were hostile to us throughout the meeting and even humiliated my son – which made all of us very uncomfortable. In that same meeting, with my son present right there, you asked us some really uncomfortable questions about him. I couldn’t hold back my tears at this point and left the room immediately. He never recovered from this insult and finally took his life. Is that what you wished for?”
A school official, speaking unofficially, said while the allegations that the boy was suspended, isolated, and removed from the basketball team are true, these were ‘reasonable’ steps taken to address the alleged misconduct.
In the school’s version of the story, communicated unofficially, the students had their exams soon after the suspension period ended. Mihir reported for the exam but Vice-Principal Binu could not find a convenient time to help the two students (Mihir and the girl student) reconcile. “Mihir was allocated a separate room during examinations for his own safety. It was feared that if he was allowed to go back to class before a reconciliation effort mediated by the Vice-Principal was done, other students in the class might get into a fight with Mihir,” the school said defending their action.
Dropping Mihir from the basketball team was an independent decision by the coach, claimed the official.
But Rajna in her letter blamed the Vice-Principal for the decision. “When asked why, his coach told him that it was your decision. Did you know how much it meant to him, being on the basketball team? And then when he begged you about it, you simply told him that he cannot be part of the team anymore. My son loved the sport, and you broke his heart,” the letter said.
Mihir wasn’t happy, like the school makes it seem, his family told TNM. Shareef, his maternal uncle, said, “Every night at home, he would be crying. He was in great distress.” According to him, the boy was suspended over a minor incident of misconduct. “He had accepted the suspension and even apologised for his actions. But the Vice-Principal continued to isolate him. That incident really broke Mihir.”
When Mihir’s parents first confronted GEMS school authorities over the excessive punishment given to him, the Principal, Biju Baby, said the Vice-Principal had acted on his own volition. “That day, the Principal even made an apology of sorts,” Shareef said.
Following this, Mihir was shifted to GPS. The family was unaware of any bullying the child could have faced in GPS until after the death, Shareef said. “We first came to know of the bullying at GPS after Mihir’s death. An Instagram group called Justice For Mihir was formed a day after he died, only to be taken down the next week. That group included students from both GEMS and GPS. Well-intentioned students who were part of the group shared screenshots with the family. That was when we first learned about the bullying.”
Shareef also accused GPS authorities of attempting to cover up the bullying. “We heard through someone that soon after Mihir died, a student approached a teacher at GPS and told them about the harassment. We understand that they decided to cover it up,” he alleged.
Ever since the death, the family has been living in Kozhikode. Mihir’s mother Rajna is finding it difficult to cope and is in no shape to talk to the media, Shareef said. Mihir has a younger sister in Class 3, who is a student of GEMS. “She hasn’t gone to school since the death. She also has not fully grasped what happened,” he added.
Hill Palace Police Station SHO AL Yesudas told TNM that a First Information Report was filed soon after the death on January 15. Currently, only Section 194 (unnatural death) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) has been invoked. “If evidence of any other crime, including abetment to suicide are found during investigation, the relevant sections will be added,” he said.
Yesudas said the police have contacted authorities in both schools as part of the investigation. “Both schools are cooperating with the investigation. But since this case involves school children, we cannot conduct questioning like we do in crimes involving adults. There are certain limitations. Factors including school timing need to be taken into consideration,” he said.
The investigation team has given out numbers to which informants can call. “The numbers we have given include that of a woman police officer. Children or any other informants are encouraged to get in touch with us. So far, we have not received any such calls,” Yesudas said.