When I saw the above picture in 'The Hindu' today, I instantly looked around it to see if I can find any comments condemning the act. And it's not at all surprising that I found nothing of that kind. The comment under the picture, as you can see, says, "… Activists staging a demonstration…, etc.". Who are the activists? And who are demonstrating by sitting on road? Are the children, activists?
The next thought I had, was what would I do, if I was asked to do the same, i.e., sit on a road without any perception of my own on whats going on and why, similar(in the aspect of perception) to those pupils in the picture. But, they might not had a say in what happened there, except sitting where they were told to sit and bending their head down when they were told to do so, in order to get a better picture like the one above.
During my last visit to my home town some months back in the summer season, I saw various rallies comprising of school children under the hot sun in support of the United Andhra agitation, but what stood out in my mind was the Visual of an open top auto trolly in a rally, carrying some school children in costumes of 'Bharath Maatha'(Mother India), who were agonisingly sweating and getting burnt under the scorching noon sun.
It's not the first time school children were made to rally around the town and won't be the last time either, if nothing is done about it. We can safely assume that this kind of attitude towards children prevails all over India, which evidently has least respect for its youngest. We demand respect from the children and never reciprocate an iota of it back. Thats how it has been.
This attitude is part of the child abuse that most of us familiarly identify in the form of respect that was demanded by the elders in a family or by the teachers in a school, etc. Putting the most condemnable sexual abuse aside, both the physical and emotional abuses that the children are made to face in India are widespread as found by the "Study Of Child Abuse: India 2007" carried out by the Ministry of Woman and Child Development, GOI. You can see the astonishing figures above.
India is also at a staggering 149th position in the world, in the aspect of Respect for Children's rights with an index of 5.42 out of 10 and under 'Difficult Situation' category, as determined by the RCRI (Realisation of Children's Rights Index) that was carried out by Humanium, an international Children's Rights NGO.
What can child abuse lead to? It can lead to all kind of atrocities that we are currently facing day after day. Once the mental balance of a child is disturbed, the damage that he/she can cause may not be demarcated. With the increasing number of cases of gang-rapes or other forms of violences that were being carried out by normal people, I wonder, if the roots for this behaviour, may well be found in the abuse that they might have faced during their earlier stages of life.
Childhood is the purest form of life as some of us quote at times. But with our acts, we are narrowing down or constraining their minds with our already made out opinions or delusional views. We need to try and respect them and their thoughts as much as we respect any other, at homes, schools or any where else. We should remember that a pure mind can be moulded into innumerable ways that can enhance humanity, but a small abuse is all that is needed to rip it off.
