Are schools in city safe for children?

Even if the rapists of the six-year-old Bangalore schoolgirl are put to death now, her parents will never be able to forget the ordeal their daughter had to go through.

Nor will lakhs of parents across the country get over this incident any time soon, knowing well that their wards are as much unsafe in the four walls of their schools as on open streets.

However, the biggest irony of this extremely shameful episode remains that it was, in fact, entirely preventable.

The Juvenile Justice Act, 2000, mandates every State to frame guidelines to avert child sexual abuse in institutions like schools, colleges, orphanages and correction homes.

The Delhi Commission for Protection of Child Rights even took the lead in this matter coming out with a complete book on child protection systems in each such set-up last year.

The National Commission for Protection of Child Rights went on to laud this effort and suggest all State governments to adopt these guidelines or frame ones of their own.

Surprisingly, only a handful of state commissions took the good advice, passing on the guidelines to schools in their jurisdictions. Others, paid no heed.

Then, compliance with the guidelines by schools and colleges is a different story altogether with most state education departments failing to enforce them. So several schools remain blissfully oblivious of the guidelines, while others simply choose to ignore them.

Nishit Kumar, Head of Communications at Mumbai-based Childline India Foundation, and a vocal child rights activist, says, “In 2006, a study by the Ministry of Women and Child Development itself revealed that 53.22 per cent of all children in India are sexually abused.

These are concentrated in Andhra, Assam, Bihar and Delhi. Inspite of this, the spending of the central government ‘on children’ in the past ten years has stayed put at 5.5 per cent of the annual budget, of which only one per cent is allocated for protection from sexual abuse.”

“Our political class has failed miserably when it comes to safeguarding our children from this
horrendous crime.”

Our government-run and corporation schools are the best examples of this gross negligence and carefree attitude.

Even in the over 1800 municipal corporation and state government-operated schools in Delhi, one can find entry gates open at all times of the day allowing outsiders to gain access and endanger students.

Often, toilets for the teachers and students are common creating grounds for abuse. Or else, the toilets are so badly maintained that students have to move out of the premises putting them in harm’s way, in any case.

Ashok Agarwal of Social Jurist, a Delhi-based humanitarian organisation, says, “I have seen teachers of corporation schools misbehave with and molest girl students ever so often.

Mostly, the parents are extremely economically-weak and illiterate and cannot take on the offending teacher or school administration. Even if the culprit is suspended after investigation, he is reinstated after a few months. We have totally failed to set examples.”

Private schools, which charge a fortune to make ‘well-rounded’ and ‘successful citizens’ of young ones, are equally guilty in this regard. Mohammad Aftab of NGO Save the Children, says, “Hardly any school, however prestigious, runs a background check of its teachers or a police verification of its miscellaneous staff.

There are no written code of conducts for them; sexual abuse is not even touched upon during PTA meetings and students are not sensitisedon subjects like ‘good touch and bad touch’.” 
   
Many activists are surprised that schools are failing to the needful despite legal provisions existent now which make them equally culpable in the event of abuse of a student.

Chennai-based Vidya Reddy of Tulir - Centre for the Prevention and Healing of Child Sexual Abuse, says, “Under Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, 2012, a person who commits such an offence in a position of authority, such as a teacher, invites aggravated punishment. Also, school managements who attempt to cover it up are culpable in the crime.”

In this context, the form brought out by several Bangalore schools disowning
responsibility for the safety of children is completely bogus, she adds.

As always, this incident has also stirred authorities into action. When contacted, Arun Mathur, Chairperson, Delhi Commission for Protection of Child Rights, informed us, “Our guidelines were already in place.

Now we will again press the state Directorate of Education to circulate it in schools. Ignorance of law is no excuse in today’s date and no establishment should take refuge under such
a pretence.”