BHOPAL: The Madhya Pradesh Commission for Protection of Child Rights (MPCPCR) wants that all schools (both private and the government) in the state should mandatorily install complaint and suggestions boxes on their premises to curb sexual or physical abuse of children.
According to Unified District Information System for Education (UDISE) data, there are 1.33 lakh schools in the state of which 99,000 are government and 34,000 are private.
In a communication addressed to the District Education Officers (DEOs) of all the districts, a member of the Commission, Brajesh Chauhan said that during his visit to schools in different parts of the state, he found that many institutions either did not have a complaints and suggestions box or had placed it at an unsuitable place.
The Commission wants that the box should be placed at a prominent location in every school. The telephone numbers of Child Help Line (1098), Police (100) and the Commission should be painted on the boxes.
The children should be told about the boxes. They should be assured that if they put any complaint into the box, action would be taken on it, that they will not be penalised for making the complaint and that their names would not be made public.
The boxes should be opened in the first week of every month in the presence of a three-member committee comprising the head of the institution and two parents. The complaints, if any, should be recorded in a register. The committee should decide what has to be done in case of each complaint and that too should be recorded in the register.
Officers of the education department, during their visits to the institutions, should inspect the said register to ensure that the school managements are taking proper action on the complaints.
“This is even more important in the rural areas, where children, and especially girls, find it difficult to share their plight with someone who can take action. This is even more so when the perpetrator is a person whom the children fear or are close to like parents, teachers or school bullies,” he told Free Press.
Chauhan says that the District Education Officers of five districts, including Gwalior, Chhatarpur, Shajapur and Raisen, have already written to the Commission saying that they would be ensuring implementation of the suggestions.
