In India, two lakh girls between the age group of five and 15 are forced into prostitution every year besides another three lakh girls in the age group of 15 and 18. Almost 9,000 more children disappear every year and are suspected to be abused.
With the objective of tackling this issue, United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF)-sponsored meet on ‘Child sexual abuse - prevention and response’ was organised here on Sunday for doctors in Western districts of Tamil Nadu.
The UN Agency has tied up with Tamil Nadu Voluntary Health Association (TNVHA), Indian Medical Association - Tamil Nadu State Branch, and Indian Academy of Paediatrics - Tamil Nadu State Chapter, to conduct four programmes for medical professionals, covering the entire State.
This was the third programme in the series. The UNICEF will also provide awareness material to doctors across the State.
Addressing the meet, Superintendent of Police M. Sudhakar, who was in Tamil Nadu Medical Services till 2002, told doctors that they had an important part to play in not only treating the victims of abuse but also in ensuring they got justice.
In the Pollachi twin rape case, in which two minor girls from the TELC Home were the victims, the doctor at Pollachi Government Hospital played an important role in linking the perpetrator to the crime.
The Prevention of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act was gender-neutral and recognised various forms of abuse, providing separate punishments for each of them. In such cases, the children may not be able to narrate what happened to them and it was up to the doctors to elicit the information, he said.
According to R. Anbu Rajan, State Co-ordinator for the programme, the focus was on creating awareness about POSCO Act, the responsibilities it placed on doctors and how to obtain forensic evidence besides procedures on interviewing the victims and alerting the police.
R.V.S. Surendran, State President, IMA TNSB, said that doctors can be prosecuted under POSCO Act, if they failed to notify the police after treating a child sexual abuse victim.