Sunday, November 4, 2007

Corporal Punishment at school- A First hand experience

Author: Ashok Murthy
Country: India

“Spare the rod and spoil the child”, how many million times did our society use this popular quotation to justify the beating up for a poor, unarmed and dependent tiny kid, all in the name of discipline.

Going to school was never an enjoyable experience for me. I attended only two days of lower kindergarten class and didn’t write an exam to pass. This was how my first year was spent.

The experience started in the Upper Kindergarten class. As a rule, whenever a child spoke or whenever the class was noisy, it used to first start with making us stand on the bench and hold up our hands. While we stood in this position, holding both hands straight up, the teacher patiently went about doing her work. After two hours of painful standing, the teacher issued the command to lower our hands. We all breathed a sigh of relief. Then she asked us to fold our palms and make a knuckle out of it and hold out straight out horizontally. She grabbed a wooden cane and with utmost care and precision went about whipping our knuckles with the wooden cane, two whips per person. If one tried to retract, it would be four whips. At the end of the day it was going home with bruised knuckles. From my part, I used to end up crying almost all the time while going to school in the morning and while coming back from school in the afternoon.

During my course at that school, punishment most commonly involved hitting the student with wooden scales, canes and in other cases making the student take off his shirt and sit on the cold cement floor.

In high school, it involved kneeling down on rough surfaces and walking for twenty minutes or more holding the ears with both the hands for talking in the line, not polishing one’s shoes or for not having a hair cut. The physical training teachers often used to kick us if we couldn’t march like seasoned armymen. One of my classmates almost lost his hearing because of one misguided cane hitting him on the ear instead of the ribs.

Under the circumstances it was but natural for me to not want to go to school. This was usually met by ridicule by family members saying I was too pampered because my own parents never laid a hand on me.

More often than not, if a victim of the beating was consoled by some other classmate, that particular classmate would be singled out at the end of the hour and beaten up again. During PUC (11th and 12th) it was less beating up and more humiliation. Genuinely sick people used to be called liars for coughing and we used to get a whack on our heads by the disciplinary co-ordinator if we were found talking to our classmates during free hours.

From my part, I felt the most pure and genuine hatred for those teachers who indulged in this act. In instances I would fantasize beating them back until they turned blue. While this thought brought a smile on my face, while I was still in the line during P.T class, it followed up with a beating. That is right, we got hit even for smiling.

The effects, well, during my primary school days, my confidence took a serious hit and I was very quiet and hardly talked to people. For most part, I was frustrated because being so small and tiny and unarmed, I couldn’t do anything. But mostly it was anger and hatred.

Today if any child were to face what I or my elder brother had to face, I would not bother talking to the concerned lecturer or teacher. I would end up at the college with a legal notice and take the teachers to the court.

The common mistakes parents of such victims make is that they don't even confront the concerned teacher. It is normally the fear that subsequent to the confrontation, their child will be singled out unnecessarily. In the process several other children end up facing the same treatment.

Edmund Burke once remarked that all it takes for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing. Generations have had to deal with physical abuse at school and in many instances, children have dropped out of school because of the fear of such teachers.

Some of the recent events have included a teacher gouging out a student’s eyes with a pen for not doing his homework, a boy being beaten unconscious for talking during class and a girl being forced to strip in class for not doing her homework. While teachers once symbolised guides and parents outside the home, today they are more commonly associated with unruly and uncivilised actions. While literacy is our country’s top priority, such teachers often are a detriment to the cause of education and act more in contravention of the rules than in imbibing a sense of responsibility to the students. Let us not encourage such people by staying quiet. If your child or your ward is a subject of such abuse, at least be responsible enough to take action and lodge a complaint. You could prevent another student from losing his eyes for not doing his or her homework. The law supports you, exercise your rights and help save a childhood.

3 comments:

Noor said...

I can only say that this was a great article, it speaks for itself, these situation should come to an end, we go 2 school 2 learn not 2 be afraid. I thought school should be fun, having ur friends with you, enjoying lessons with ur fun teachers and such.
But it seems to be the opposite of that, it became something all of us dread to go to, and can't wait 2 get out of.
I remember being hit when I was younger as well, and the funny thing is that they do it mostly when we're young!!!!

we shouldn't be afraid of teachers n if they saw that we can stand up for ourselves they won't do anything, but it's that when we do realize it's wrong, they stop the hitting!
That's why my teachers this year aren't that pleasent. some seem to enjoy the fact that we forgot 2 do our homework or had a low mark.
aaand lastly i'll just wrap this up, cuz i feel really strong about this cuz it shudnt be happening, especially from educated people.
Thank you for bringing up such an important issue! ;)

Unknown said...

Haven't I seen a similar post somewhere else..? :)

As Noor says, it is a very important issue. I am surprised because corporal punishment stopped in Peru about 10 years ago in national schools, and I am pretty sure it has never happened in private schools. It's usually our parents who do the job!..

It is not fair for children to be disciplined in such a way that generates a trauma for them later in life, and well, law is a really good way to prevent it! It's a great article :)

Anonymous said...

Really great article Ash! Like others have said, it speaks for itself...I think every child has gone through pretty much the same experience as you have described in your article. And it's not just physical abuse, but even the verbal abuse and humiliation that continues even when kids grow older...which severly wounds your self-image and confidence.I remember how our teachers used to insult not only us, but even our family members (esp. parents), for bringing up "kids as animals or savages". I remember once, at my coaching centre, a teacher even went to the extent of saying to a boy's mother that even "her house-maid was a better mother than she was". This too, in front of all the kids in the class...Imagine, saying such harsh and disrespectful words to an educated working lady from a well-to-do family...comparing her to a house-maid...

These modern day "gurus" don't even spare the parents, how can you expect them to care for kids?