Sascha Wil­son

Se­nior Re­porter

sascha.wil­son@guardian.co.tt

Over­whelmed as she ar­rived in front of her son’s school dur­ing a can­dle­light vig­il last evening, the moth­er of 15-year-old Jay­den Lalchan faint­ed at St Stephen’s Col­lege’s front gates.

Fa­ree­da Lalchan re­gained con­scious­ness but re­mained seat­ed on a chair, as hun­dreds raised their can­dles and plac­ards, as they called for jus­tice for Jay­den and an end to bul­ly­ing in schools. The para­medics ar­rived in an am­bu­lance some­time lat­er to at­tend to her.

Fa­ree­da and her hus­band Roshan were among scores of peo­ple who were in the pro­ces­sion that start­ed at the prom­e­nade in Princes Town and end­ed at the school.

Jay­den’s cousin Joshua Mo­hammed made a tear­ful ap­peal to those gath­ered to take a pub­lic stand against bul­ly­ing. Not­ing that bul­ly­ing comes in var­i­ous forms, in­clud­ing so­cial, phys­i­cal and men­tal, he said it of­ten goes un­seen.

Mo­hammed re­called that Jay­den was a lov­ing, kind and com­pas­sion­ate child.

As a for­mer St Stephen’s Col­lege stu­dent, Jay­den’s aunt Rad­i­ca Ramjohn said she was an­gry, em­bar­rassed and dis­ap­point­ed by the in­ac­tion of school of­fi­cials. Vow­ing to not rest un­til she gets jus­tice, she said Jay­den will be the one to put an end to the al­leged bul­ly­ing in the school.

She said Jay­den’s par­ents have been cry­ing non-stop and have not eat­en or slept since his death.

“This could have been pre­vent­ed if in­ves­ti­ga­tions were done and if they dealt with the mat­ter with a sense of ur­gency,” Mo­hammed said.

Al­so ad­dress­ing the gath­er­ing, Princes Town MP Bar­ry Padarath said he will be tak­ing a pri­vate mem­ber’s bill to Par­lia­ment in Jay­den’s name for an­ti-bul­ly­ing laws in coun­try.

Ex­press­ing his out­rage over Jay­den’s death, Pro­gres­sive Em­pow­er­ment Par­ty leader Phillip Alexan­der said bul­ly­ing is in silent cri­sis in this coun­try. He said Jay­den’s tragedy should strike fear in the hearts of every par­ent, as they trust ed­u­ca­tors to pro­tect their chil­dren in schools. He ac­cused the Min­is­ter of Ed­u­ca­tion of sweep­ing bul­ly­ing, which he de­scribed as an epi­dem­ic, un­der the car­pet.

He said his sis­ter was forced to re­move her daugh­ter from a promi­nent school in Port-of-Spain be­cause she was be­ing bul­lied and school of­fi­cials took no ac­tion.

“That boy’s blood is on all their hands. They are re­spon­si­ble,” Alexan­der lament­ed.

The vig­il was es­cort­ed by of­fi­cers of the Princes Town Po­lice Sta­tion, in­clud­ing ASP Bhan­dan. In­sp Mo­hammed, Sgts Charles, Boodoo and Ra­manan.

Jay­den, who was the on­ly child of his par­ents, died on Oc­to­ber 3. His fu­ner­al will held to­day at 12.30 pm at the JR &D Hall in Princes Town.