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LOCKED inside the school building one Saturday afternoon, teacher Sivakami Sivanantham panicked and hurt herself while trying to get out. Now she is suing the Ministry of Education (MOE) for damages.
Ms Sivakami climbed through a ventilation opening to eventually find herself hanging by her hands close to 4m above the ground in the rear of the building. She then let go, falling to the ground and fracturing her ankle.
The 39-year-old teacher was hospitalised at the Singapore General Hospital for a week but was in and out of the hospital for about seven operations. All told, she was on medical leave for more than a year.
In her suit, Ms Sivakami is claiming that the ministry had been negligent in not ensuring that she had a safe working environment.
Because she was locked within the premises, she also contends through her lawyer, Mr Perumal Athitham, that the MOE caused her wrongful or false imprisonment.
Yesterday, on the first day of the hearing, Ms Sivakami, who appeared frail, gave Justice Belinda Ang of the High Court a detailed account of what led to the incident.
The court heard how she had returned to Zhangde Primary School at 9am on Saturday, Feb 11, four years ago to prepare for the following week’s classes.
She left her handbag and mobile phone in the teachers’ room on the second floor before going into a classroom on the same floor to work.
At about 1pm, she emerged from the classroom to find herself locked out of the staff room. The roller shutters to the staff room and the ground floor exits of the staircases were all locked, so she was unable to leave the building.
“I went to the second floor corridor to shout for help but there was no response,” she told the court.
In a “state of frenzy”, she climbed out through an opening by a staircase and fell. A staff member heard her cries and called for an ambulance.
Yesterday, in his opening statement, State Counsel Peter Koy from the Attorney-General’s Chambers, representing the MOE, argued that Ms Sivakami, who is still with the school, was responsible for her own injuries. These were caused by her “own unreasonable, rash and dangerous act”, he said.
Mr Koy also told the court about a briefing which all teachers had to attend in December 2005.
In the briefing, they were told that the school would be locked at 12.30pm on Saturdays and those who wanted to stay beyond that had to inform the school’s operations manager, the State Counsel said.
Teachers also had to sign in and sign out in an attendance book.
Ms Sivakami did not do so. When cross-examined by Mr Koy, she said she was unaware of these rules.
She was also unable to remember if she had attended the briefing during which the rules were discussed.
However, the State Counsel said there was no evidence to show that she did not attend the briefing because she was working that day.
To show that Ms Sivakami acted in a rash and dangerous manner, Mr Koy asked her why she did not use the rear entrance to the staff room, which had a fingerprint access system, to get to a phone and call for help.
“I did not think of it,” she answered.
Ms Sivakami said she tried to lift several of the shutters but they did not budge.
It was only then that she decided to squeeze her way through the ventilation opening and jump out.
The hearing continues today.
