Children stand up against child sex abuse

KVS Giri More than 500 children came out on the streets to raise their voice against child sexual abuse.While the Necklace Road is usually frequented by joggers and cyclists, Sunday morning saw a different sort of crowd make a bee-line to the area. As many as 500 school children had gathered to raise voice against child sexual abuse (CSA).While their innocence reflected in the way they were seen taking selfies, catching up with friends and laughing all the way , it is children, and not adults, who're spearheading the fight.Kavita Krishna, an architect and mother of an eight-year-old girl, said, “A Sunday morning should be about sleeping in late and relaxing, for these young minds. But, instead, they are here to raise awareness about CSA. It just goes to show how as adults, we have failed to provide a safe environment for our children to grow up in.“Matter of shameIn most cases victims of child abuse suffer in silence in the fear that parents won't believe them. “My best friend was abused by her own brother, but she was not able to talk to her own parents about it. After she confided in me, she told her parents and their initial reaction was denial! If parents don't believe their own kids, then who will?“ questions Prayashi Roychoudhury, a Class VIII student.With less support system found in families, no wonder then, that the children decided to take their matters in their own hands.Ramesh Kidambi, a parent who participated in the event, feels, “Sexuality is something we always try to push under the carpet. We need to speak to the children about `goodtouch-bad-touch' and tell them there's nothing shameful about it.“Need for an open dialogueRanjana Singh, teacher at a city school, says, “Kids are exposed to plethora of information and they are unable to sift between the right and wrong. We need to open up and tell them all they need to know and do if they are victims at any point.“Agreeing with her is Rupa Pillai, member of a parent initiative that is fighting against CSA, who says, “The need of the hour is to develop an environment within families as well as schools that gives kids a platform to speak about such issues.Unless we openly talk about it, our kids won't be safe.“Children leading the fightIt all started a month back as part of a social initiative that Murchana Roychoudhury, a Class XII student, took for a national-level quiz contest. “I had to do a social awareness campaign.So many CSA incidents had come to the fore at the same time, so I decided to do this. I started talking to my friends about it and that's how the word spread. It has now become a big movement with many joining hands.We will continue our endeavours to fight this issues.“As part of their project U Cube -Unseen, Unheard -secondary and senior secondary class students have conducted workshops in eight schools in the city in the last one month, where they educate the primary school kids about CSA. And since they themselves are school kids, it has been easier for them to strike a chord with other students. One of the members of the group, Aditya Macedo, a Class X student, says, “The whole didi-bhaiya thing has been working well for us.The children are able to connect with us better, as they think of us as their own. In fact, there have been instances where kids came to us and shared their stories.“