A female schoolteacher who subjected a pupil to corporal punishment has been asked to give her month's salary as compensation to the child to avoid being sacked, police arrest, and other disciplinary measures taken against her.
After deliberating on a corporal punishment complaint filed by the parents of the child, the Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) directed Adarsh Public School in India to take disciplinary action against the teacher under provisions of the RTE Act.
Two members of the NCPCR, Parmod Sharma and Prof Nistha Jaswal, recommended that as interim relief, a month's salary of the teacher be given to the victim as compensation. The commission directed the school to send an action-taken report along with a photocopy of the cheque given to the child's parents. The Principal of the school was directed to sensitize the teacher as well as the children of the school to corporal punishment.
According to the complaint, on January 30, the child scored seven out of 10 marks, the highest in the class, in a computer written test. Despite this, the victim was beaten and hit on the hands with a steel scale. The distraught child didn't speak to anyone for six hours after returning home.
After the parents made a complaint to the Principal, the teacher admitted that she had beaten the child thinking that the child had got zero marks in the computer test. Taking Suo - Moto Cognizance of the incident, the NCPCR summoned the Principal and the teacher of the school on February 3.
During the hearing, the teacher admitted that earlier also she had slapped the child. She apologized and gave an assurance that she would not repeat the mistake. While this is a first in response to a child given corporal punishment, it does have merit and is one way for the teacher to be mindful that similar consequences might befall them, should they break the law. I doubt if many teachers can afford to lose a month's salary and it's considerably more effective than a mere reprimand.
In 2011 High Court justices Md. Imman Ali and Sheikh Hassan Arif outlawed the barbaric, uncivilized, ignorant practice of corporal punishment in Bangladesh schools and madrasahs declaring it "cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment and a clear violation of a child's fundamental right to life, liberty and freedom".
Much to the shame of the teaching fraternity, however, it still continues in all its dishonor throughout the country, especially in rural Bangladesh, where old habits based on total ignorance are well established, practiced, and reluctant to change.
A child who is beaten in school, madrasah, or home is never grateful to the perpetrators or the society that permitted the outmoded abuse. You cannot expect a flower to blossom in all its wondrous glory if its stem is beaten, abused or in other ways mistreated. Corporal punishment in all settings must stop.
The writer is a former newspaper and magazine publisher and editor, an award-winning writer, royal goodwill ambassador and human rights activist
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