R'than drafts 'Jaipur Ghoshna' to safeguard students

In first of its kind, the Rajasthan government has drafted safety guidelines for students in the form of a book titled “Jaipur Ghoshna”.

Additional chief secretary, social justice and empowerment department, J C Mohanty, who presented the book to Governor Kalyan Singh said, "Such guidelines were needed and they envisages adequate safety arrangements to keep children safe against different hazards and natural calamities.

Good/bad touch

The guidelines lay down an exhaustive list of dos and don’ts for the administration to follow in case of electricity, fire and gas-related hazards. For the first time, education department has mentioned in the guidelines that schools should organise four programmes in a year to educate children about the good/bad touch, drug abuse, cyber bullying, online safety etc.

According to sources, the child empowerment department has identified 400 schools in Jaipur to run safety audits as a pilot programme. Some are government-run schools, while others are managed by private bodies.

Safety audits

A designated Child Safeguarding Officer would be responsible to carry out safety audits in schools. The guidelines propose to make schools safe for children as mandated under different policies and laws and attempt to prevent and respond to any incidences of negligence, violence, abuse and harm to the children while at school or travelling on school provided transport or during school trip or event.

Similarly, it forces installation of ramps for kids with special needs and correcting poor lighting to prevent instances of ragging. Along with this it is mentioned that a proper place for the disposal of sanitary napkins must be there in schools.

The guidelines also direct the schools to ensure safety mechanisms are in place while organising sports event, annual function, drama and skit, street play campaigns, excursions, picnics and study tours that involve kids’ participation.