Rioting in India over school sex scandal

[+chilli]

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - Police clashed with angry residents in the Indian capital on Thursday after a mob damaged a state school following a TV report that accused a female teacher of prostituting girl students.

The channel said the teacher blackmailed some girls into the sex racket after she drugged them and took nude photographs of them.

"She blackmails us ... made a CD after giving us sleeping pills," said one of the girls interviewed by an undercover TV reporter who masqueraded as a client.

"We are scared to talk about it as our reputations will be destroyed, and what our parents will say," the girl said, sitting in a car with the reporter.

After Janmat TV broadcast its sting operation -- which showed the middle-aged teacher apparently taking cash for the girl -- hundreds of young men and students threw stones at police and damaged buses and cars.

Police responded with bamboo cane charges and tear gas, and a Reuters witness said more than 20 private cars and buses were damaged.

Earlier, angry parents and residents entered the school, damaging its property.

TV footage showed rioters throwing stones at shops and trying to break their locks in the area, located near the national parliament. Police were seen beating protesters with bamboo canes.

Police said they would act against the teacher if found guilty. Her whereabouts were not immediately known.

"We are taking the CDs and other recording details from the TV channel," said Delhi police spokesman Rajan Bhagat.

India has witnessed a spate of cases of mobs taking law into their own hands over past few weeks.

On Wednesday, Muslim residents in the Taj Mahal city of Agra burnt trucks and rioted after the death of four people hit by a lorry.

This week, police in eastern India helped a mob beat a suspected thief in front of a TV camera, with one policeman tying the victim to his motorbike and dragging him until he passed out.