Sev­en stu­dents from St An­tho­ny’s Col­lege have been sus­pend­ed, as school and ed­u­ca­tion of­fi­cials probe claims of an un­der­ground fight club at the school. 

The clan­des­tine club, re­port­ed­ly in ex­is­tence since last year, in­volves stu­dents bet­ting on lunchtime box­ing match­es on the third floor, away from teach­ers’ and au­thor­i­ties’ scruti­ny.

A source at the school al­leged there are look­outs dur­ing the match who en­sure that teach­ers, se­cu­ri­ty of­fi­cers and deans of dis­ci­pline are not around dur­ing the fights.

“Some­times, the stu­dent comes with box­ing gloves. Stu­dents pay and the one who wins the fight gets all the mon­ey,” the source claimed.

Last Thurs­day, a stu­dent was se­ri­ous­ly in­jured dur­ing a fight at the school. The stu­dent suf­fered a swollen face, bruised ribs, bruis­es about his chest and back and a bro­ken nose af­ter be­ing at­tacked.

Of­fi­cers from the Four Roads Po­lice Sta­tion re­port­ed­ly held nine stu­dents.Sev­en of these stu­dents have since been sus­pend­ed.

Both T&T Uni­fied Teach­ers’ As­so­ci­a­tion pres­i­dent Mar­tin Lum Kin and Catholic Ed­u­ca­tion Board of Man­age­ment (CEBM) CEO Sharon Man­groo de­nied knowl­edge of a fight club at the school. 

 Man­groo said, “The sev­en stu­dents in­volved have been sus­pend­ed. I will in­ves­ti­gate the box­ing re­port. From the Prin­ci­pal’s ac­count of the fight, this was not a box­ing match. It seemed to be the re­sult of an in­ci­dent that took place in the last term.”

Ed­u­ca­tion Min­is­ter Dr Nyan Gads­by-Dol­ly al­so said she knew noth­ing about the club.

“The Prin­ci­pal has in­di­cat­ed that there is no truth to these al­le­ga­tions,” Gads­by-Dol­ly said.

She added that de­tailed in­ci­dent re­ports, stu­dent files and dis­ci­pli­nary records will be used to ex­am­ine the sit­u­a­tion in its en­tire­ty be­fore the rel­e­vant de­ci­sions are made.

Mean­while, Con­cerned Par­ents Move­ment pres­i­dent Clarance Men­doza said there should be ze­ro tol­er­ance for vi­o­lence in schools, re­it­er­at­ing his call for more guid­ance and safe­ty of­fi­cers, and so­cial work­ers in the school sys­tem.