Nobel laureate Kailash Satyarthi expresses concern over growing child sexual content on the net

Bengaluru: Nobel laureate Kailash Satyarthi on Monday expressed concerns over the growing demand, supply and consumption of child sexual content across the globe, including India.

In an interaction with reporters on the sidelines of the convocation of the Chanakya University here, Satyarthi said, “It is unfortunate that the demand, supply and consumption of child sexual material is growing. This is because of a lack of regulatory measures.”

“Social media was quite impactful in tackling the climate change crisis. But it is also spreading a lot of negative propaganda, fake news, deep fake, etc... Child porn on the dark net and the web is circulating fast. This is a globally debatable issue,” he said.

According to Satyarthi, one of the biggest challenges which needs to be addressed is to protect children from sexual abuse, consumption of such material as well as negative influence of social media.  

He called upon religious leaders to take the initiative to protect children from being victims of crime.

“I urge leaders of different faiths to say that for the sake of god, a crime against a child is a crime against god and humanity. They should speak out loudly and say that if any boy/girl is abused or raped, it is a crime against god. Despite repeated appeals, they hardly say it. No religion permits crime against children,” he said. 

Appreciating laws like Pocso Act to protect children and their rights, he said, “It is good that rules have been tightened and actions are being taken. But I would say investment on children is still not enough.”

Satyarthi said compassionate intelligence/quotient was important to counter the ill-effects of Artificial Intelligence (AI).

He said his team was working with global universities, including Harvard, and with Unesco on how to measure compassion quotient. 

“We are working on and devising methods to measure the level of compassion at a given point of time and on enhancing it,” he said.  

“Artificial intelligence is bringing some opportunities. But humanity may have to pay the biggest price to embrace AI the way it is being done by everyone. So, if we have to counter the dangers of AI, we have to come up with compassionate intelligence,” Satyarthi said. 

“AI is controlling and regulating the human mind. There is evidence that AI has started lying. AI can control language through data and if the language is filled with hatred and division, it is a big challenge for humanity,” he said.

Degrees awarded

In its first annual convocation, Chanakya University awarded degrees to 31 post-graduate and post-graduate diploma students. Vice-chancellor Yashwantha Dongre said 23 students got placements, four have joined higher education and the rest are under mentoring for entrepreneurship.