Expressing concern over an increasing number of students resorting to the extreme step of committing suicide on being chided by their teachers, the Madras High Court directed the State government to constitute a committee for finding a solution to the problem.
Justice M.V. Muralidaran issued the direction while disposing of a case filed by a chemistry teacher of a Corporation Girls Higher Secondary School at Shenoy Nagar here. The petitioner had challenged disciplinary proceedings initiated against him for allegedly abusing the students.
“This court is now to decide on an issue which has to be described as ‘delicate’. I am using the word ‘delicate’ because this matter has brought to light the issues that have started creeping up in today’s educational system between the teachers and students.
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“The manner in which teachers behave and the way the students behave are essentially to be looked into by this court since the children are the future leaders of our nation. We no more live in an archaic age where to condition or train a young child, abusive techniques can be adopted.”
“Let it be parents or teachers, they ought not to abuse or threaten or manhandle young children,” the judge said and went on to point out media reports of several schoolchildren having committed suicide on being reprimanded by their teachers.
“This shows that children's minds are very sensitive and they have resorted to taking their lives by themselves. In those days, the school children feared their teachers as they would beat them very badly in the event they did not study or perform properly.
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“Even if they were beaten, they would not take it seriously, thinking that it is for their welfare that the teacher is behaving strictly. But that is not the case today. The children have access to worldly things in a click of a mouse or touching their smart phone. They have started taking the scoldings of teachers personally. They react immediately,” Justice Muralidaran added.
He directed the School Education Secretary to constitute a committee comprising of psychiatrists and educationists.
Headed by the Director of School Education, the committee should assess broadly the psychological issues faced by the students in schools and identify them. Thereafter, dedicated counselling and orientation programmes should be conducted for teachers as well as students across the State.
The teachers should be advised and taught to handle children effectively without using “abusive techniques,” he said. The judge also directed the government to ensure that every school had a dedicated counsellor to help children in need of emotional support. The School Education Secretary was further directed to file an action taken report in the court by April 9.