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Dr Shantha Sinha

Chairperson, National Commission for Protection of Child Rights

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Shantiniketan urine shocker: What goes on in India's hostels

5 questions answered

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Will that girl child get a justice in short duration? Asked by: a
Justice will be rendered but processes will have to be secure to ensure proper justice is done.
Madam, this might be an odd incident out of many more such happening, would it be? if yes that would be worrisome. How does one ensure that child rights are protected always, especially in hostels, orphanages etc Asked by: narayanan
I agree with you that this is not a stand alone incident, and in many of the residential settings there has been punishment and violence inflicted on children. One important method to see that children are cared for is by ensuring processes of engagement with children by the care-givers through review meetings and other systems of child participation.
If u remember Ayesha murder,this happened in a hostel.and now this incident.How can we avoid such situations??do u think good warden,good security can solve this problem??There should be a strict law to punish the ppl who behave ILL.I have only suggestion to everyone.we encounter such issues and we discuss this only for 1 week.we need to follow up until the issue is resolved.some member from ur organisation should be appointed for one case each till the justice is done. Asked by: Chanakya,Singapore
I fully empathise with your concern about conditions of children in hostels, residential schools, juvenile homes and so on. There is a need for greater transparency in the manner in which all such institutions are run. This can be done quite easily by instituting social audit of such institutions, wherein there is participation of all stake-holders in assessing the manner in which such homes are run. The social audit can be done by a team of persons comprising reputed local NGO, Child Welfare Committee, well-known child rights advocates, local school principal from the nearest government school and a couple of parents.
Do you think institutions should be penalised in terms revokation of accredetation? Asked by: Mansi
This is a good idea of having accreditation through a regulatory body. Currently the Juvenile Justice Act has provision for registration of all juvenile homes but it does not automatically mean that the homes are regulated and monitored. It would be useful to have norms and standards for such homes based on which they could be classified in accordance with the grade. An excellent grade can be awarded if all norms are maintained and on the other end of the spectrum a poor grade can be awarded if there are far too many gaps in the system. Such a procedure would at least give us an idea of the performance of such homes and an opportunity to rectify the gaps. There accreditation is necessary.
Your advise to parents? Asked by: Anu
Parents have to be in regular touch with children and ask probing questions on their daily experiences in such homes and hostels. Often children would not like to share or tell parents about the difficulties that they are facing because they do not want to burden the parents and might also think that they can actually handle such difficulties. Therefore it is all the more important that parents insist on knowing the facts and giving confidence to children that they can intervene and bring whatever complaints to the notice of the authorities.It is advised that parents make such complaints in formal forums of parent teacher association and not do it as individual complaints. This is to avoid victimisation of the children, and also an enabling a positive and systemic response from the authorities.