SEXUAL ABUSE OF CHILDREN

According to the World Health Organisation, child sexual abuse means “involving a child in sexual activity that he or she does not fully comprehend, is unable to give informed consent to, or violates the laws or social taboos of society”.

Sexual abuse of children gained public interest after publication of the report by the Women and Child Development Department entitled ‘Study on Child Abuse India 2007’. The report estimated that “more than 53% of children in India have probably been sexually abused and many have never shared the fact of this abuse with anyone”. Also, recent child sexual abuse cases in India have pointed to the need for stringent legislation and action on this poignant issue.  

The report says, “One of the major problems in understanding the scope of the subject of 'child abuse' is that it is extremely difficult to get responses from children on such a sensitive subject because of their inability to fully understand the different dimensions of child abuse and to talk about their experiences. It is therefore difficult to gather data on abused children.”  Child rights activists, on the other hand, argue that the problem may be the lack of skills on the part of the questioners to create the environment and the trust needed for the child to share his/her experiences.

Sexual offences against children can and are committed in situations such as marriage, trafficking, employment, and many more. It is important to understand the circumstances that allow and may even be a reason for this abuse. In slums, for example, many families make their female children marry young as a protection against sexual abuse. For some parents, marriage this is the only way to ensure that the girl is ‘unavailable’.

Abuse may also be condoned because of financial considerations. Among the Naths of Bihar, prostitution is commonplace. When a family doesn’t have a daughter, girls are purchased from other parts of the state and pushed into sex work so that the family can live off their earnings. Also, children who work as domestic labour, or in hotels and restaurants, are susceptible to sexual abuse at the hands of employers and customers. In addition, children across caste and class lines are vulnerable to abuse from relatives and friends of the family.

Jenny Kitzinger (Defending Innocence: Ideologies of Childhood) says that “...the notion of children’s innate vulnerability... is an ideology of control which diverts attention away from the socially constructed oppression of children...”. She suggests that we replace notions of ‘vulnerability’ with ‘oppression’ and ‘protection’ with ‘empowerment’. She also denounces the practice of telling a child that s/he “can say ‘no’”. In her opinion, this gives the child a sense that s/he can resist a power that, in reality, s/he probably cannot.

Abusers know that children are less likely than adults to speak about the incident/s; that even if they do, few will believe them; that even if they are believed, community members will probably not do much about it, and that even if some action is taken there are loopholes in court processes that can be availed of.

The draft of the Prevention of Sexual Offences Against Children Bill 2011 delineates various kinds of sexual abuse and the prescribed response to each under the law. In the final section of the Bill, there is a detailed section that lists responsibilities of various duty-bearers to the child - police officers, child support services, medical officers and case workers. It also lists the protocol to be followed during court processes and by police and medical practitioners. It should be taken into account, however, that the bill might be difficult to implement in smaller towns and villages, where basic judicial processes are flawed.

Despite this concern as to making the Bill operative, almost all stakeholders accept that current legislation is insufficient to deal with all forms of sexual abuse on children. They also acknowledge that social workers, superintendents of residential homes, wardens, counsellors, teachers and family members all need training and becoming sensitized to the issue, and that a minimum set of actions must be put in place so people are able to help a child who is being sexually exploited. It is only by developing better ways of hearing children and giving them proper support, that effective mechanisms can be created to address their exploitation.

  

Source: infochangeindia

HEARTS OF GOLD

The end of the school year came around and so did the memory of many shared experiences with my 7^th grade students: the cards sent to the children from Yashodhara, Asha-Kiran’s Shelter in India, Uttam and Hansa’s picture (the founders of Asha-Kiran) receiving the envelope containing the cards, the picture of Hansa and Asha-Kiran’s children published in the blog, Yashodhara children writing back on cards made by them with care, the excitement of my students before Uttam’s visit to our high school (which finally could not take place), the big surprise Uttam and his son Uilhas gave them by holding a videoconference, their conversations with me, their questions about my sponsored child Ravi, exams, nervousness. In my heart I felt a pang of pain for not being able to go on teaching my students from IES Celia Viñas.

Three days before the end of the course, my 7^th grade students told me, “Ma’am, tomorrow we’ll have a surprise for you”, and I said: “And I will wear a sari” (I knew how excited they were about seeing me in one).

Their surprise made ​​me cry, I got the best thank-you and end-of-school year gift they could have given me: two envelopes with letters and money for the children of Asha-Kiran. They had agreed to bring their own pocket money and, after counting it, it added up to 46€. Four students came with me to the bank to transfer the money to Fundación Asha-Kiran. They had also made bookmarks ​​on the occasion of Peace Day (with messages in Hindi, Marathi, Moroccan, Spanish, English and French), and a group photo with their signatures for the children of Yashodhara.

In their letters, their love for Asha-Kiran and the children was evident - messages from their sincere, loving, noble, caring hearts; "hearts of gold" for me too (IT WAS IMPOSSIBLE NOT TO CRY).

I thanked them for their surprise present and for their moving words. I truly felt that in the past nine months they had grasped and learned more than the English I had taught them. I was surprised because when they chose the “perfect gift” for me, they showed a deep knowledge of my heart and feelings, which is not so easy to do nowadays. And, wearing my sari, I told them that since I had been in India, I felt my heart was torn up between Spain and India. They had undoubtedly sensed something of the sort.

The next day, I reciprocated with a small tasting of flavors from India. I brought papadums (Indian pancakes) with mango chutney and raita sauce. I taught them how to make lassi (an Indian drink made with yoghurt), and we tried to learn Bollywood steps. Our last day of school and course farewell party was undoubtedly devoted to INDIA.

The day school marks were handed out, each student received a DVD that I had made with photos of all the above events and the audio version of the videoconference with Uttam and Uilhas.

 

Thanks to my dear Hearts of Gold for remembering the hearts at YASHODHARA.

I also wish to thank my colleagues for their work and enthusiasm for my dear A-K, for their contribution, for brainstorming future possible fundraising activities, for purchasing Indian items at our bazaar, not only for themselves, but as gifts for Xmas and other occasions. Thank you for being available and for your generosity. Many grains of sand can make up a sizeable hill.

A new school year is about to begin. I would love to write a lot of articles like this one - articles featuring actions of solidarity from students and teachers.

I also wish to encourage many teachers who, upon reading this article, may carry out awareness-raising activities in their schools and commit to working for an NGO like Asha-Kiran. As a teacher, I can say that all of the activities undertaken in the past years at different schools (such as HUELÍN HIGH SCHOOL in MÁLAGA, “the pioneering one”, the Solidarity Bazaar at ULYSSEA HIGH SCHOOL in UGIJAR-GRANADA, and the activities of the students at CELIA VIÑAS HIGH SCHOOL in ALMERÍA) have been unforgettable experiences for my students and myself.

All of these activities have been invaluable, such as the one my dear students from 7^th grade (or “Hearts of Gold”, as I call them) played the leading role in, because the donation and the activity was done of their own accord. As a teacher and collaborator at Asha-Kiran, I appreciate all the support the Foundation gave to my initiatives, i.e., the videoconference with Uttam, who managed to set some time aside in his schedule to be with my students, and the readiness of Hansa and the whole team to make it possible for values of solidarity to reach young people.

Thanks to ASHA-KIRAN because its work awakens and invites us to LIVE FROM ESSENCE.

 

Mª Ángeles Arráez - Collaborator at Asha-Kiran 

OPENING OUR YOUNGSTERS' EYES

Uttam Módenes: a practical lesson via videoconference about NGO’s, sustainability and economic systems with 11^th grade students from Celia Viñas High School

The week after a similar videoconference with seventh graders, the teacher of ‘Science for the Contemporary World’ (CMC), Encarnación Segura López, and 11^th grade students had a practical class in which some of them asked questions to the founder of Asha-Kiran concerning India's economy, sustainability, and other issues relevant to the subject of CMC, which had been previously taught. At the end of the videoconference, Uttam encouraged young people to work, to live in justice and solidarity, and to protect the environment. In short, he encouraged every one of us to do his/her bit, from our daily activities, to make our world better.

ADA, one of the students, wrote:

"It was the first time I was in a videoconference and I must say I was surprised by how a high school class can now talk to the founder of an NGO in India to which a teacher in our high school belongs, who was also present.

It seems an admirable endeavor in every way, which I’d love to do at some point in my life. I think of all the people who have been, are being and will be benefited by this man’s will and desire to help them; it is touching and amazing.

Hopefully there will still be other people like this to change the world; we will help them by doing our part."

Mª  Ángeles Arráez - Contributor at Asha-Kiran

BARELY SURVIVING

The social worker found a boy preparing a paste of garlic so that his little brother could stave off hunger until their parents returned from the fields. It is heart-rending how poor children grow up too early, how older children care for younger ones, and how the destitute just manage to cope – if they do. It is tragic that this story is endlessly repeated.

The Integrated Child Development Services program (ICDS) in India is supposed to address extreme deprivation by providing supplementary food, rations and growth monitoring through community-level anganwadis (kindergarten) for children under the age of six. However, 74% of these children do not receive any supplementary food from the anganwadi in their region.

The survivors of hunger in childhood are pursued into adulthood. More than one in three adults is underweight. The government also has a program to provide food supplements to pregnant and lactating women, but only 21% of pregnant women and 17% of lactating women receive any food supplementation.

There are many newspaper reports on children who die of hunger but whose cause of death is recorded as measles or diarrhoea. In the state of Maharashtra, a minister shamelessly announced that 80 children died of malnutrition a day over four years across the state. The urban poor are not better off. Street children and the children of construction workers are more at risk since they do not have access to health and nutrition schemes.

Surveys show that the poor are eating less today than 40 years ago. Government committees dare to conclude that this drop is voluntary and merits a reduction in the minimum calorie requirements, allowing the government to further reduce the amount of grain available through the Public Distribution System (PDS). This, in turn, forces the poor to pay market rates for food - or do without, which may mean cooking wild roots and leaves to survive.

The government programs mentioned, the ICDS and the PDS, have been sabotaged by vested interests. Health activists say that the government forges financial partnerships with companies that make biscuits and baby food. Paediatrician Vandana Prasad condemns the use of commercial products for treatment of severe acute malnutrition when locally-made foods are effective, appropriate and cheaper.

Community involvement - through feeding programs, self-help groups, grain banks, and so on - plays a critical role in tackling malnutrition, but its participation is of limited value unless the government acknowledges its obligation to ensure people’s right to food. Without an assurance of sufficient food through the PDS, people are left to the mercy of the market. The consequences speak for themselves. It is a matter of concern that even as the government talks about expanding food security, we read of proposals that would effectively slow down the PDS. People must act through civil society organizations to make the government meet its commitment to the country’s poor and hungry.

Source: infochangeindia.org

HERDED LIKE CATTLE

Children are the population group that probably suffers most when communities are evicted from their homes or land.

Forced eviction of communities from their homes to give preference to development projects, urban renewal, restructuring or beautification programs has become commonplace in India. Dispossessed and compelled to live in sub-human conditions, tens of thousands of people watch helplessly as their rights are overlooked with respect to livelihood, food, health, education and security.

Children are one of the largest marginalized groups. The loss of a home, livelihood and community affects children in multiple ways. A displacement is not only physical but also economic and social. The demolition of a home often means the destruction of a lifetime's savings, which not only shatters the present but also points to a bleak future for parents and children.

Forced evictions, normally accompanied by lack of adequate rehabilitation, almost always lead to economic and social distress. For the few families who get 'rehabilitated', housing conditions are often poor and inadequate. The right to adequate housing involves not only a house but also access to basic services, work and education facilities. Both in rural and urban areas, resettlement sites are consistently lacking in basic facilities like water, sanitation, electricity and street lighting.

As most resettlement sites lack functioning schools, displaced children are often forced to halt their education abruptly. Girls are more likely to drop out due to lack of easy access to schools and safety concerns. In situations of economic stress, it is usually the girl-child who is pulled out of school first. Many girls are also forced to drop out due to the increase of domestic work, loss of social networks and support systems, and increased time spent away from the home by adults.

Using provisions available in international human rights instruments like the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, and the Convention on the Rights of the Child, both of which India has ratified, could help bridge the gaps. The Basic Principles state that evictions are acceptable only under the most exceptional circumstances and after all alternatives have been explored, and painstakingly detail the nature and extent of State responsibility in cases of development-based evictions.

Recognizing the specific vulnerabilities of children and other marginalised groups, the Basic Principles list a variety of measures that can be adopted from the earliest stages of displacement in order to mitigate its adverse consequences. If incorporated into law and implemented afterwards, said principles could greatly aid in ensuring that forced evictions are minimized and their impacts do not lead to further human rights violations of vulnerable sections of society, particularly children's.
 

Source: infochangeindia.org

PROMOTING SYNERGY IN ASHA-KIRAN

The Community Kitchen concept is very widespread in the slums of Pune. Be it among families or communities with close ties and harmonious coexistence, women choose to cook together, thus reducing costs (in food and fuel) and, not always on purpose, helping to safeguard the environment with less CO2 emissions.

Through our Community Center project in the slums of Hadapsar, we wished to replicate this model of food preparation with two aims in mind: empower the women who belong to Self-help groups in the Community Center, and reduce the cost of supplying meals to the Day Care Centers for Migrant Children.

When we started working with the Day Care Centers in December of 2011, a catering company was supplying the food to us. At the same time, the work of Asha-Kiran in Hadapsar was beginning to bear fruit through the formation of the first women’s groups, which quickly became Self-help groups. Always attempting to integrate the work of the different projects, we realized that this was a good chance to take a first step towards the employability of women from the Hadapsar group via the Community Kitchen.

Asha-Kiran provides the women the necessary foodstuffs for the meals as well as a space specially equipped for cooking them. Every morning, they are in charge of making lunch for the 250 children of the five Day Care Centers we work with. Asha-Kiran’s staff directly supervises the quality of the food and delivery times to ensure that these 250 children receive the best possible service.