The 35-year-old building of a government upper primary school in Piplod village collapsed on Friday morning, resulting in the deaths of at least seven children and injuries to 29 others, with 13 in critical condition, officials said. The part of the Piplodi Government School building housing Std VI and VII gave way, burying about 36 children, police said. “Seven children have died so far,” Nand Kishore Verma, SHO of the police station in Manoharthana, said. 

Five of the children studying in the school in Jhalawar’s Manoharthana block, about 340 km from Jaipur, have been identified.  They are Kundar, Kanha, Raidas, Anuradha and Badal Bhil, the SHO said. In response to the tragedy, five teachers from the school have been suspended, and a high-level inquiry has been ordered by the state education minister, officials informed. The injured are currently receiving treatment at the SRG Hospital in Jhalawar and the Community Health Centre in the Manohar Thana area of the district. 

Denying allegations that the school building was in a dilapidated condition, Jhalawar district education officer (elementary), Narso Meena, said that heavy rainfall in the region, combined with the accumulation of rainwater in the adjacent field behind the building, caused water seepage into the wall of one of the classrooms. This seepage led to the collapse of the classroom ceiling.