The Supreme Court on Monday said that a teacher at a school in Uttar Pradesh’s Muzaffarnagar who ordered her students to slap a classmate “targeted one community” and that the state must take responsibility for the incident.

“The teacher is targeting one community. We will go deep into this. Is this the way teachers teach students – is this quality education? State must take responsibility for this incident… Has the school appointed some counselor for the child? If this incident has happened, then it should shake the conscience of the state. It’s a serious issue,” a bench of Justices Abhay S Oka and Pankaj Mithal made the verbal observation while hearing a PIL that raised concerns over the incident.

The apex court also said that, at first impression, it was a case of failure on the part of the UP government to comply with the provisions of the Right to Education (RTE) Act, which prohibits physical and mental harassment of students and their discrimination on the basis of religion and caste.

Further, the top court directed that the investigation into the incident should be supervised by a senior IPS officer nominated by the state. It also said this officer should file his report to the apex court.

Earlier, the apex court had issued a notice on the PIL on September 6, asking the UP police to apprise it about steps taken to investigate the incident.

Notably, the father of the Muslim kid, who was seen getting slapped by his classmates in a viral video, denied the communal angle and said that it is not a Hindu-Muslim issue.