Indian couple devastated after Bahrain school asks them to pay fee of dead daughter

Dubai: A Bahrain-based Indian school has left the parents of an Indian girl “devastated” after calling them up to clear outstanding fees of their eight-year-old daughter, who had died in January. [caption id=“attachment_2383080” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Representational image. Reuters image[/caption] Shiny Philip, the mother, received a call from Indian School Bahrain (ISB) last week about outstanding tuition fees for her daughter Abiya Shreya Jophy despite having informed the school of her death and clarifying that she was not enrolled at the start of term in April. Shiny, who is recovering from the loss of her only daughter, has fallen into a state of depression once again following the school’s phone calls, her husband Jophy Cherian told Gulf Daily News. “It is unfortunate that the staff members at the school were so insensitive towards a mother’s feelings,” Jophy, who was also called up Monday for the same demand, said. “When they called her 10 days ago on our landline, she told them that we lost Abiya and requested them to remove her name from the records. She has been very upset ever since and she has been devastated, trying to cope with the loss with much difficulty,” he said. ISB later apologised to grieving parents of Abiya, who died from chickenpox in January. The school’s chairman Prince Natarajan said an investigation has been launched into the “administrative error”. “We share the sentiments of the parents and we apologise,” he said. Cherian and his wife are from Kerala and have been living in Bahrain for the last 27 years. PTI