Pinki Virani has recently been honoured with a National Award for being the first in the Indian Sub-continent to bravely come out in public as a victim of child sexual abuse and incest; her book — Bitter Chocolate: Child Sexual Abuse in India — and her activism in the area of prevention of child sexual abuse (CSA).

Her work has created national awareness: That child sexual abuse cut across all classes and castes in India. That 40 per cent of girls and 25 per cent of boys under 16 years are sexually abused at any given time in the country, 50 per cent of these in their own homes or by adults in position of their trust. That homosexuals and lesbians are all not ‘born’, some become so because of their child sexual abuse. That children can abuse children at school if they have been victims at home. That some can grow up to become criminals, from common crime to drugs to sex-offenders; or some can grow to become ineffective parents

Pinki Virani conducts, gratis, interactive sessions with parents and teachers in schools, and colleges, on invitation of principals. Some frequently asked questions (FAQs) at these sessions.

What care should parents primarily take to safeguard their children?

Parents can begin by answering questions as and when the child begins asking them. There is no point in them saying “chee”, when the infant is asking what his own penis is, or when the little girl is looking at her own vagina, say, while being bathed. We use every other word possible than the simple biological ones for penis, vagina, breasts, anus. The problem is, if you don’t use the right words you cannot teach your child the basic difference between a “good touch” and a “bad touch”. And once you have been able to teach your child that, you can continue — as parent — to answer him/her, on questions like pregnancy, condoms, etc.

This is the age of AIDS, the age when the boy child is under particular sexual attack and the girl-child is being told by frequently beamed images that she needs only to sell her sexuality — look and sound like an item-girl or model — to be successful in life.

Parents need to guide about self-protection from this ostensibly progressive babble by demystifying sex for their children. And keeping in mind the horrific outcomes of child sexual abuse, the prevention-strategies of a parent can possibly protect the child’s children too, i.e. two generations. 

Why should any interactive session on such a subject not include young children?

Because it is parents’ job to talk to their own child. Don’t they teach their child how to cross the road safely? The school then plays the secondary role of reinforcing messages on physical, mental and other kinds of safety. Research also proves that messages are most successful when both parents are actively present through the grooming years.

CSA in schools by authorities. How should this be dealt with?

Three solutions. The first two can easily be done by schools and the third, by government if it cares about the children of India as its future citizens. The schools  should follow a practical and sensible approach in hiring teachers, coaches, peons et al by checking with earlier places of employment. Schools need to set up a common website where information is pooled in on teachers — with photographs — who have been sacked, and for what reason. Naturally this can only follow if an FIR has been lodged. This is called ‘name & shame’, a practice followed quite successfully for a while in England by the police themselves. The third solution — there need to be — as recommended in Bitter Chocolate — Child Protection Units (CPU) and Child Protection Courts. CPUs are those units attached to one major police station in each city which will deal only with child sexual abuse cases where sensitised men and women police officers take down complaints, do initial video recordings of the child’s statement, do on-spot counselling et al. This lessens the child’s trauma as also that of the family’s.

Parents feel so vulnerable in front of school authorities...

I know that parents feel absolutely helpless when school authorities choose not to take cognisance of complaints against a teacher. This often happens and I am in empathy. But parents do need to realise that if the school is being callous about the child’s mental-sexual-physical health, then that is not a decent school; it means there will be more trouble in the following years. It is important therefore, that parents be present — and strong — in the school’s Parent Teacher Associations right from the beginning itself.

Don’t uneducated parents need guidance on this?

Ah, you will be surprised how much ‘un-educated’ the ‘educated’ ones are when it comes to such things. I have heard so-called ‘educated’ parents saying that Michael Jackson cannot be an abuser because he is a good entertainer. I have also seen so-called ‘good’ homes dragging their boy-children to a swami near Karnataka though there is international proof of his paedophilia. But yes, parents need to be armed with information so that they, in turn, can arm their children.

You first shone the spotlight on CSA in India in the year 2000. How has your own life changed since then?
The process has also been an immensely learning one; painful too but that’s part of the territory. I have had insights into people’s behavioural traits. And my own earlier patterns. I’m wiser; as they say, sadder but wiser.

(For further queries to Pinki Virani mail to sundayherald@deccanherald.co.in)