[Reader-list] When girls fear school -- By Kalpana Sharma

[Chintan Girish Modi]

From
http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/columns/Kalpana_Sharma/article945706.ece

When Girls Fear School

By Kalpana Sharma

Sometimes you hear a story, or see a person, and you cannot forget. Last
month, I listened to a bespectacled middle-aged woman, dressed in a sari
with a scarf tied around her head. She was speaking at a public hearing on
“Gender, Equality and Education” in Hyderabad, organised by ASPBAE (Asia
South Pacific Association for Basic and Adult Education) and Asmita, a
resource centre for women. In a voice choked with emotion, she narrated the
tragic story of her 14-year-old daughter, Renuka.

Renuka was a student of AP Social Welfare Society Residential School at
Shivareddypet in Ranga Reddy District of Andhra Pradesh. She was in Std V.
According to her mother, she was keen to study even though she was older
than the rest of the class. On February 21 this year, a girl screaming in
her sleep set off panic in the dormitory. The teachers sleeping in the next
room, who were in-charge of the hostel, beat the girls to stop them from
screaming. Renuka apparently had a head injury and became unconscious. She
was admitted to the government hospital and her family was informed.
Incensed at what had happened, her brothers questioned the school staff and
also spoke to the local press.

When Renuka recovered, her parents brought her back to the school. But the
principal and the staff refused to take her back saying she had brought a
bad name to the school. The parents continued to make efforts to get her
readmitted. But Renuka was so disheartened that she poured kerosene on
herself and attempted suicide. With 75 per cent burns, there was little
chance of survival. Her distraught mother wants to know what crime her
daughter had committed to get such treatment. A case has been registered
against the teachers but you wonder how many more cases of corporal
punishment are forcing young girls out of school.

Only half the women in India are literate. The government plans to change
this drastically in the next two years and has launched Saakshar Bharat, a
programme for adult literacy that will focus on women. It aims to raise
overall literacy from 64 per cent to 80 per cent and reduce the gender gap
between male and female literacy from the current 21 per cent to 10 per cent
by 2012.

Root of the problem

But the problem of the low percentage of female literacy lies at the point
when a girl, who wants to go to school, drops out. The reasons are often
linked to poverty; parents prefer to keep daughters back and send sons to
school as girls are more useful at home and at work. But increasingly, even
when parents are ready to send their daughters to school, the girls cannot
continue because of simple reasons that have nothing to do with the
‘software' of literacy.

There are millions of girls like Renuka who want to learn, but not at the
cost of being beaten. Or sexually abused. Several respondents at the public
hearing spoke of sexual abuse, particularly in residential schools where
tribal children are sent, as a reason for a high dropout rate among girls.
This is an aspect of education that needs to be monitored, documented and
dealt with. What parent would risk sending a daughter to a school where she
is beaten or sexually abused?

The ‘hardware' issue is a much more straightforward problem. Girls drop out
of school, particularly when they hit puberty, because there are no toilets.
If they exist, they are usually dysfunctional.

Lalithamma from Thamballapalle Mandal in Chittoor District of Andhra Pradesh
gave a vivid picture of the absence of toilets and the impact on girls. Her
organisation conducted a survey of 80 schools in the mandal. They found that
52 schools had no drinking water facilities and 57 schools had no toilets.
Five schools had toilets but without doors or water. Girls were forced to
use the open space behind the school. But as boys also accessed the same
area, the girls could not go.

Lalithamma said girls sipped water through the day to avoid going to the
toilet. Her data from just five schools makes horrific reading:

Thamballapalle High School: 172 girls, two toilets, no water.

Kannemadugu High School: 58 girls, two toilets, no water.

Renumakulapalle High School: 40 girls, one toilet, no water.

Gopidinne High School: 60 girls, two toilets, both not working.

Kosuvaripalle High School: 53 girls, one toilet, no water.

Worst still, these girls return to a hostel at the end of the day where
again the toilet facilities are inadequate. They fear going out in the dark
and often skip the meal to avoid having to defecate.

This is just a thumbnail sketch of the situation in one mandal in Andhra
Pradesh. But it mirrors conditions in most parts of rural India. The
situation is not that different in municipal and government schools in urban
areas. Girls from such schools in Hyderabad also spoke of the absence of
toilets. We want girls to go to school, get through primary school and
persist in the higher classes. Yet how can they in such circumstances?

So while the corporal punishment and sexual abuse are issues that need to be
investigated closely and documented, a beginning can at least be made by
ensuring that there are working toilets for girls in schools. It is such an
obvious point that it hardly needs to be made. And yet numerous surveys on
girls and education bring out this one need. Why is it not being given as
much importance as curriculum, teaching standards, shortage of teachers etc?

Email the writer: sharma.kalpana at yahoo.com