Students learn to handle eve-teasing in corpn schools

Catch them young

With an aim to bring gender sensitisation among school students and tackle eve-teasing, a month-long workshop was organised by the New Delhi Municipal Council.

‘Zero tolerance to eve-teasing’ was the theme of the experiment in senior secondary schools run by the NDMC, which concluded on Sunday.

“The programme aimed to make students aware about the humiliation that one goes through if eve-teased. Students are full of energy at this tender age and if channelled in a constructive way can lead to tremendous results,” said NDMC director of education Vidushi Chaturvedi.

The initiative included night-outs for girl students. “These girls were taken for night-outs at Jawaharlal Nehru University to watch a play. After that they ate at a dhabha there,” said Chaturvedi.

“It was an effort to make them fearless at any time of the day or night,” she said.
Around 40 students were selected for different senior secondary schools under the limits of NDMC.

Of these, 40 students, around half of them were boys. “We consciously wanted more boys to participate in the programme. They learnt a lot during this period about the problems faced by the opposite sex,” the director said.

These 40 students were divided into groups of six.

“They went to different localities and informed kids about the menace of eve-teasing and its after effects. They were accompanied by at least two male teachers,” Chaturvedi said. Students also talked with parents to know about vulnerable areas.
Gender sensitisation

“They were deployed near bus stands and markets that fall on the way to school from their homes. When they saw a teenager passing lewd comments to girls, they gave him counselling and pursued him to join the workshop,” the director said.
The students even went to police stations to know about complaints filed regarding eve-teasing.

More such programmes will be introduced to bring awareness among schoolchildren, the director added.