Several Kanpur girls silently bear sexual abuse: Survey

KANPUR: Nearly 40 per cent of girls in the city are victims of some form of sexual abuse, revealed a study conducted by the home science department of Chandra Shekher Azad (CSA) University of Agriculture and Technology. It includes girls who are in the age group of 9-12 years and have been molested either at schools or homes. Many girls have faced physical and emotional neglect and social abuse as well.
Out of 249 girls surveyed, 123 reported of instances where their private parts were touched.While 41.2 per cent were forced to expose their genitals or subjected to other forms of sexual abuse. Whereas many girls reported of sexual act where the abuser forced the girl to touch his genitals.
Under the supervision of Neelima Kunwar, office-in-charge, extension education and communication management, CSA, the students of home science conducted a study among 249 girls under the age group of 9-12 years in 2010. The study was conducted in five Hindi and five English medium schools. The girls were interviewed with the help of a questionnaire.
"Generally, girls are sexually abused by an individual known to her family or somebody in her surrounding institutes. Rarely the abuser is a stranger," said Neelima. "In most of the cases, the girls were forced to show their body parts to the friends, cousins or teachers who are the abusers. They even are exposed to pornography and are forcefully kissed," she said.
Notably, abuse happens when someone tries to control or hurt the girl. It can be physical such as hitting or pushing. It can be making a girl feel worthless or making her possessive or jealous, to stop her from speaking to friends or family or even forcing her to participate in sexual activities.
Neelima mentioned that the victim is continuously targeted by the same abuser. With the passe of time the abuse rate increases. For example in the case of sexual abuse, the abuser in the initial stages shows his body parts and then it progresses to kissing, fondling, penetration and so on. And at the time he ensures to threat the child by abusing her physically and emotionally. Abuser simply try to convince the child that nobody would believe if they tell about the abuse.
However, such inappropriate sexual behaviour with a child such as fondling a child's genital, making the child fondle the adult's genital, intercourse, rape and sexual exploitation occurs because the respondent fails to express themselves after facing abuse. "Girls are least aware about such practices and secondly, they their parents due to some kind of physical abuse they experience at home.
Some girls are ashamed and feel guilty despite being subjected to fear and frustration.
Normally, the children who have been sexually exploited suffer from infection, genital injury, abdominal pain and urinary tract infection or behavioural problems. Besides, they face academic difficulties, concentration problem, depression, fear or shyness, insomnia and difficulty in learning.
Besides this, there are physical, emotional and neglect abuse. Physical abuse is one of the common abuse contributing to 72 per cent of the cases. In such cases, the child faces repeated beating and injuries, kicks, burns and other form of torture. As per the survey, a majority of children are either beaten by mother or schoolteacher. This is followed by emotional abuse. It includes verbal and mental abuse which leads to serious behavioural, emotional and mental disorders. Girls are even the victims of social abuse.
However, psychologist suggest that such unethical practices can be controlled if parents practice certain prevention strategies such as anger management and fill the communication gap between children and themselves.