Child rights and NCPCR

‘Spare the rod and spoil the child’ is our age old practice. So it would take time to abandon this habit and adopt new ways of taming the erring or unruly students in classes. Corporal punishment has been illegal, nevertheless even now incidences of such punishments are reported. However, ordinary cases of physical punishment are still now generally ignored even by students and guardians as well, but they react vehemently when it goes to the extreme. That teachers are entitled to mete out corporal punishment to errant students are infact ingrained in students’ and guardians’ psyche, so they normally don’t protest if it’s not too harsh even in elite schools. However, recent case of suicide of a student in La Martiniere For Boys school has changed the scenario and made students, guardians and school authorities more sensitive to corporal punishment. Principal of La Martiniere has promised not to wield the rod ever again and school too has cautioned the teachers against any physical punishment.However,National Council For Protection of Child Rights(NCPCR) has demanded removal of the Principal and withholding of two increments of three teachers.

Intervention of NCPCR is praiseworthy in elite institution like La Martiniere,but does it equally take interest in ordinary institutions where Child rights are violated? What action do they take against an establishment that employs children as labourers, which is a cognizable offence under law. What step does it take when a boy in a tea shop or restaurant is abused and beaten at the drop of a hat by the shop owner? Does it think about a boy who is used as bonded labourer all day long and paid a pittance at the end of the day by the employer? Definitely answer would not be that encouraging as in case of La Martiniere or the like.