A refugee charity boss has accused school chiefs of institutional racism after she was forced to pull her child out of a top primary.
Ekta Marwaha says her nine-year-old daughter was subjected to a two-year bullying campaign at Bearsden Primary School during which she was targeted by a pupil multiple times “because of the colour of her skin”.
The mum, chief executive of Refugee Sanctuary Scotland, says the school failed in its duty to address the bullying and the extent of the problem was “kept hidden”, with council officials now upholding aspects of her complaint.
Ekta says a subsequent probe also found vital information about her daughter’s case was missing and has refused to drop the case despite her daughter now being removed from the popular feeder school for Bearsden Academy – previously ranked second best in Scotland.
She has now taken her case to the watchdog for public services.
The charity chief told the Record: “By the school not addressing racism they are institutionally racist themselves because they are advocating it and allowing it to happen on a daily basis.
“I haven’t given up the fight despite my daughter having moved.
“I want the council to be held to account because institutional racism is not acceptable.
“My work focuses on helping individuals who don’t have a voice to fight for their rights. If I didn’t do it for my daughter I’d be a hypocrite.”
Ekta first went to the school with concerns in May 2023 after her daughter became withdrawn and was refusing to go to school.
The youngster confided she was being subjected to bullying and in February last year she was went home in tears after an incident in the classroom.
Ekta said: “The girl had made a comment about why people didn’t like her ‘because of her brown skin’.”
“I sent an email about their duties under the equality act and advised them that they should have informed me of the incident and not sent my daughter home in this state.
“I had a meeting with the school, who said they had carried out some restorative work with the child.”
Ekta had further meetings with the school and helped make arrangements at the school’s request for educational talks around Hinduism and Sikhism, the religions the family follow, but they did not take place.
In September, another incident happened in the playground.
Ekta said: “Again, race was brought into it. My daughter was told ‘I don’t want to play with you, you’re not one of my normal friends, you’re different from all of us’.
“She was excluded because of her skin colour again.
“They said the child was asked to apologise and she was aware she’d done something wrong.”
No further action was taken in relation to the pupil and in September, Ekta’s daughter requested to move schools.
She said: “I told them she doesn’t want to be here because she doesn’t feel like you’re supporting her or dealing with the racism she’s facing. I was told that was my choice and the school would be taking no further action.”
Ekta’s removed her daughter from the school and submitted a formal complaint.
In the complaint to East Dunbartonshire Council she said: “The school have a duty of care to ensure my daughter is psychologically safe and other than checking in on her occasionally they have done nothing to reprimand the perpetrator therefore the acts of bullying and racism continue.”
In October, the council upheld her complaint that communication between her and the school had not been effective.
The local authority partially upheld complaints over how school staff handled the allegations of bullying and racism and that her child’s mental health and wellbeing had suffered as a result..
The mum then submitted a request for all information held by the school and council on her daughter and discovered that various meetings and communications had not been logged by the school, along with one incident of bullying.
She said: “The subject access request showed there are big gaps in terms of their reporting and recording.
“Half the meetings I had and half the dialogue I had with the school had not been recorded.
“How do you sort a problem if you’re hiding the problem?”
The local authority also declined to release data on bullying incidents at the school under data protection laws, because there were only between one and four incidents recorded.
The school met with Ekta again in December but she says she was given no more assurances.
She has submitted a complaint to the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman.
Ekta said: “The school and the council have not taken this seriously.
“The say there are infrastructures in place, but they’re clearly not working.
“It’s going to take time to get my daughter back on track. I’m a single mum and moving schools has been a huge upheaval for us and big adjustments have had to be made.
“In this case the victim has had to move and the perpetrator has won.
“They need to take a hard look at how they address racism as the school and council have failed my child.”
Ann Davie, Chief Executive, East Dunbartonshire Council said: “The Council does not comment on matters involving individuals, families or Council officers.
“All complaints to the Council are dealt with through the appropriate process. Similarly, all requests for information whether made under data protection or freedom of information legislation are dealt with in accordance with the law.”
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