By Soroor Ahmed, TwoCircles.net,
Many times more children die while going to school every year in India than office-goers on way to their respective offices. 2012 started with a tragic head-on collision on the very first working day, that is foggy January 2 morning. Eleven children died, and as many number of them received serious injuries in Ambala. Some may be maimed for life. The very next day four school-children received injuries when the vehicle in which they were traveling overturned in Bhopal. Those who survived these accidents ended up traumatized for whole life.
The Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, 2009 (also called RTE Act) talks about removing the physical and mental torture of school-children but is silent on the safety of their life. The truth is that the responsibility of the government does not stop just after providing proper class-rooms and teachers and by removing what is called the pressure of examination.
It is not just that children on these vehicles get killed, especially during the chilly winter of North India. News of school buses running over pedestrians and knocking down cyclists and bikers are quite common. Sometimes the father or brother of the kids carrying them to school on their two-wheelers also meet with accidents. An overwhelming number of these tragic mishaps take place while on way to school and not while on way back home. The reason is obvious. Be it the children, parents or drivers all have to meet the ‘deadline’, that is, they have to reach school on time. A military discipline is expected from the tiny tots but no such punctuality is demanded from the adults. Nobody is there to physically punish or pull up if s/he is late as the word discipline becomes meaningless after graduating from school.
School children walking home from school in Azamgarh. [TCN Photo]
Perhaps those who enacted RTE never realized that nothing is more devastating on psyche of the kids than the non-stop imposition of artificial discipline and punctuality on those who need utmost care in the tender age.
It is not just the issue of promptness. The very timing of the school is questionable so is the strict enforcement of the dress-code yet the RTE Act has nothing to say on them. In the past government schools would run between 10 AM and 4 PM. The timing of private schools was a bit earlier.
But that is till quarter century back. Today school, especially during the winter season, start almost after the sun-rise. Unless and until any directive comes from respective district administration the schools are not closed or timing not changed even if the temperature is at almost freezing point. Parents are virtually forced to turn their shivering kids out––even if it is still dark––on the streets to catch buses, autos, vans, rickshaws etc which have absolutely nothing to warm them up. The windowpanes are usually broken and the doors almost open for the winter wind to enter their vehicle.
If the boys or girls wear any warm jacket, muffler or monkey-cap other than the colour of school uniform or trouser or pants, instead of shorts and skirts, there is every likelihood of they being reprimanded, fined or physically punished for violating the rule of the school.
It is not just that the school children perish in accidents. They also die of cold and collapse in the school assembly with no first aid arrangement in most schools.
Today’s children start off for school much earlier than their parents a generation ago. Not only the classes start early even cities and towns have got expanded. Unlike in many western countries there is no concept of neighbourhood school in our country. Children are sent to schools 10-15 km away or even more. The traffic jams have increased manifold even in the smaller towns.
School bell rings much earlier now because the management do not want their vehicles to get stuck in traffic jams and delay the classes. So while the small, weak and apparently tongue-less children leave their homes very early the healthy and more stoutly-built elders leave their homes for offices, shops etc leisurely at much later time.
Non-stop pressure at such a tender age affects the overall health of the children much more than anything else. Besides, they get killed or maimed for no crime of their own. Yet there is stony silence as if they are meant to be killed. If the law-makers failed to enact effective RTE Act to stop this crime against children the media, obsessed with the Anna campaign, had no time to debate such serious issue involving the life of the generation next.