In a bid to deal with the menace of sexual harassment, the West Bengal govt has decided to include ‘good touch’ & ‘bad touch’ courses in the school syllabus from the next academic session.
The school education department has roped in the Confederation of Indian Industries (CII) & Child Relief & You (CRY) to implement the project.
The introduction of the concepts of ‘good & bad touch’ in schools would be done in a phased manner. “Initially, the project will be covered in more than 300 schools in Kolkata, Howrah, North 24-Parganas, South 24-Parganas, Malda & West Midnapore. The target age-group will be four to 12 years,” an official attached with this project said.
“We don’t want to complete this project in a haste. This is a serious matter & we want to complete it in a proper way to protect children from any kind of sexual harassment. Once we are done in the selected districts, we will move on to another 5 to 6 districts,” he added.
The syllabus will have 2 parts — one for the students & the other for guardians, teachers & school staff.
As far as students are concerned, the focus would be on understanding their psychology, change in behaviour & how to react during physical training sessions inside or outside the school.
“We have introduced a paragraph on children going for swimming classes. We have highlighted that they shouldn't allow anyone to touch the uncovered parts of their body except their parents. Even in case of doctors, they should allow them to touch an injured area only in front of their parents. There is a line where we are asking them to shout for help without any hesitating if someone touches them inappropriately,” the official said.
School teachers & parents would be asked to communicate with children through storytelling to know whether they have been touched improperly, harassed or assaulted by anyone.
They (teachers & parents) would also be asked to be alert if someone tries to be over friendly with students/children & tries to interact with him/her alone.
According to the National Crime Records Bureau’s report for 2016, crime against children had increased by nearly 11% between 2015 & 2016 & Bengal registered the highest number of such cases.
In 2017, the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) had conducted a survey that came up with some shocking revelations. It found that more than 50% children they interacted with or surveyed had faced some form of sexual abuse.
Source Link
Picture Source :
