Teaching a wrong lesson

THAT awareness about child rights and ways to inculcate positive discipline in them is still lacking becomes evident from the incident in Hisar, where the staff of a private school allegedly blackened the faces of seven class IV students who failed to perform well in a test. The five boys and two girls—one of them a Dalit—were so punished without realising that it could hurt the cause of universal education, besides scarring the psyche of the children. Performing well in the examinations is necessary and the schools and teachers strive to attain that. But the method cannot justify the end always. It can, in fact, have an adverse effect with children giving up education because of the fear of punishment and experiencing a mental block by not asking what they do not know, for it is curiosity that opens vistas of knowledge. For those from society’s underprivileged sections, encouragement and incentives are all the more necessary.

The education outreach can sometimes fail to take into account that teachers should be qualified and acquainted with child psychology. It requires firmness to instill discipline, but tactful handling can prevent it from getting blown out of proportion as every student has strengths and weaknesses. Students are known to take extreme steps because of humiliation. Studies by NGOs have pointed out that corporal punishment is commonplace, with nearly one-third of the kids having received it, caste and gender being the main basis of discrimination, and violence having societal acceptance as a form of discipline.

In India, imparting education is a task that faces great odds in terms of infrastructure and other wherewithal, and the pressure may test the teachers, too. Schools should have redress mechanisms, with there being a ban on corporal punishment. Blackening the face of politicians gets regarded as expression of dissent in a democracy, but young children with faces blackened as punishment is just not acceptable.