In 2014, when a six-year-old girl was sexually assaulted by two gym instructors on the premises of a private school in Bangalore, there were protests by parents who mobbed the school. The principal was arrested. It was, rightfully so, a news item for many days, forcing the government to act.
The government of Karnataka immediately swung into action and mandated that all schools should install CCTV cameras on the campus. Tellingly, while private schools complied with the government’s order, none of the government schools did so.
As recently as March 2017, the government once again mandated that all residential schools should have CCTV cameras. Once again, the government did not follow its own rules. Reportedly, most of the residential schools and hostels run by the Social Welfare Department (SWD), government of Karnataka, do not have the cameras, and those that do, cannot vouch that they are in working order.
Why is this important today? Most readers may not know that a 10-year-old girl living and studying in a government-run institution in Bangarpet, Kolar district, was allegedly dragged to the terrace of the hostel and raped by the cook working in the very same institution. This happened in mid-August (or mid-July, according to varying news reports). The child reported to the warden (a male) and the assistant cook (a female). Neither took any action. When the child went home for a festival holiday, the crime committed against her came to light. The parents immediately filed a complaint; the warden and the assistant cook were arrested.
A few newspapers reported the crime. That was it. Are we so immune to the plight of the girl child that such a news item does not even register on our “outrage radar” anymore? There are thousands of hostels run by the SWD for the benefit of those from the SC, ST and backward classes in the State. Some are hostels only, while others are residential schools. The victim here is twice marginalised — by social group and by gender. We can add one more angle — Bangarpet is not quite Bengaluru. Perhaps news from the margins does not register in the Vidhana Soudha?
The questions
There are many questions that the SWD and the government in general have to answer:
1) Who looks out for the safety of this girl child? Who owns the responsibility for the safety of this ‘ward’ in the hostel run by the government? If the warden himself is a part of the criminal assault on the child (by wilfully covering up the crime), who is the next in line to own responsibility? Do they owe the children and their families an assurance (and a plan of action) on how they will prevent such crimes?
2) How is it that a girls’ hostel has a male warden? Should they not have a policy of appointing only a female warden for the girls’ hostels? Can the department tell us how many girls’ hostels (and mixed gender residential schools) are under the charge of a male warden?
3) Are there systems in place that proactively shield the children from the human predators? With sufficient safeguards and presence of trained female personnel who can closely supervise and guard the children, perhaps such incidents can be averted.
4) Do the children in the hostels have any avenue to reach out for help when the staff appointed and paid to take care of them is criminally unhelpful? Is there a hotline? A telephone? A visiting nurse? Anybody? The child had to wait until she went home to report the utterly unspeakable crime she was a victim of.
5) Most importantly, how many such crimes have gone unreported? How many are covered up, thus giving licence to the perpetrators to keep preying on the vulnerable children.
6) If there are no systems in place, is the government really a good ‘caretaker’ for the vulnerable children? Does it have the capacity, expertise and intent to create a safe space for the children in these hostels?
7) Is the girl child (or boy child for that matter) eligible for suraksha bhagya in institutions run by the government, let alone elsewhere in society? Does the child have a right to safety?
Who is willing to answer these questions? If there are no answers forthcoming, it is time to shut down the hostels and give up the pretence of social welfare. Let the children live with their guardians and in their own communities. But then, this is a whole new topic for another day — do young children belong in institutions run by paid government workers?
(Dr. Lalita Rao and Dr. Vibha Shetty are members of a concerned citizens’ action group in Bengaluru. The views expressed by the authors are personal.)
