Barbaric corporal punishment must end

Dear Editor:
This refers to the article “Thrashed pupil awarded teacher’s salary” written by Sir Frank Peters. An Indian female schoolteacher who subjected a pupil to corporal punishment has been asked to give her month’s salary as compensation to the student to avoid being sacked, police arrest, and other disciplinary measures taken against her.
The Chandigarh Commission for Protection of Child Rights (CCPCR) took this action. After a hearing on a corporal punishment complaint filed by the parents of a child today, the CCPCR directed Adarsh Public School, Sector 20, to take disciplinary action against a teacher under provisions of the RTE Act while exercising power under Sub-Section 3 of Section 15 of the Act.
Two members of the CCPCR, Parmod Sharma and Prof Nistha Jaswal, recommended that as interim relief, a month’s salary of the teacher be given to the victim as compensation. The commission directed the school to send an action-taken report along with a photocopy of the cheque given to the child’s parents. According to the complaint, on January 30, the result of a written test of computer was declared and the child got seven out of 10 marks, the highest in the class. Despite this, the victim was beaten up and hit on the hands with an iron scale due to which the child remained mum for six hours after returning home.
In Bangladesh the High Court justices Md. Iman Ali and Sheikh Hassan Arif in 2011 outlawed the barbaric, uncivilised, ignorant practice of corporal punishment in Bangladesh schools and madrasahs declaring it “cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment and a clear violation of a child’s fundamental right to life, liberty and freedom”.
K M Abul Hasnat
Sadarghat, Chittagong