Police probe online abuse against London school principal

POLICE are investigating the alleged online abuse of an Indian-origin school principal who was characterised as German dictator Adolf Hitler following her attempt to ban the hijab for very young pupils.

Neena Lall, the head-teacher of St Stephen’s School in east London, was forced to reverse her decision to ban the hijab for girls under eight years, after backlash from the community.

A complaint has now been filed with local police in Newham, east London, about emails, Facebook posts and other social media messages received by both Lall and Arif Qawi, the former chairman of governors, The Sunday Times reported today (18).

Local police confirmed that they were assessing “a report of malicious communications following abusive e-mails having been received” in connection with the case.

Qawi claimed that a campaign of messages, some abusive, over several days had forced the school to reverse its hijab ban.

"I resigned because I did not agree with reversing the hijab ban and to protect the head-teacher. She was told that if I left, the campaign would stop,” he told the newspaper.

“No head teacher or governing body should be subject to the sorts of abuse we have heard reported in these recent incidents,” said education secretary Damian Hinds.

Under the Department for Education guidelines, uniform policy is a matter for individual head-teachers and their governing bodies. Next week, Ofsted inspectors are to publish a report praising the school’s leaders and governors.