It’s a school of horrors. After a male staffer at a Bengaluru playschool was arrested for allegedly sexually abusing a girl, more and more skeletons are tumbling out of its cupboard. Parents of many more girls have now filed complaints against him, and it is being suspected that he might have abused even the boys. Imagine the scale of the horror considering that the abuser had a free run of the facility for eight long years.
It turns out the 32-year-old supervisor was not only in charge of the CCTV system at the school and transportation service, he even changed children’s dress and accompanied them to the toilet. During investigation, it was revealed that the staff sent “naughty” children to him to scare them into “behaving”. Not surprisingly then that the school’s principal too was arrested. This episode highlights the lack of regulation and monitoring of playschools. In most states they don’t even require to be registered or licensed. The National Commission for Protection of Child Rights is said to have prepared guidelines to regulate playschools but they have not been notified.
In the absence of laws, the preschool scene is a free-for-all. Many are operated out of private residences and do not even have the required space, facilities or trained staff. Prominent preschool chains, who have turned the idea into a successful business model, give out franchisees to whoever approaches them. Since preschools deal with children below six years of age, they don’t come under the purview of the education department. By definition, children in that age group are the responsibility of the women and child welfare department, but the reality is there is hardly any monitoring of the facilities. It’s time playschools are made to play by the book. Governments must bring laws to regulate their functioning. There must be strict monitoring and the violators must face punishment. For, abuse of children is no small matter and cannot be allowed at any cost.