Image source : Hindustan Times
A four year old boy is accused of sexually assaulting his classmate who is also his age in school classroom and washroom in a reputed Delhi school. The news is more saddening than shocking looking at the age of the victim & accused. When Delhi police is concerned about how to deal with the case because according to section 82 of Indian Penal Code nothing done by a child below seven years of age can be considered an offense I am concerned about what prompted that child to do this.
Experts asserts that child of this age don’t understand sexual behavior than what prompted him to unbutton a girl and touch her private parts with fingers and sharpened pencil. Who is responsible for this behavior of a child? He must be reenacting something he has watched. So what environment we are giving our children to grow. Isn’t bad parenting also the reason for this?
Parents has full faith in schools and the incidents like murder of seven year old boy Pradyuman by a senior student and then this sexual assault by a 4 year old boy of his classmate is breaching that trust. If school promised full scrutiny of children either by teachers or help staff everywhere in the school premises than how such incidents is possible? How two students of a junior class left alone in the classroom and why no one noticed a boy in girl’s washroom? It is negligence & lethargy on part of school.
Parents & schools need to coordinate together in giving fearless, free environment to the children. I am still unable to understand why a 4 year child acted that way. He must be counseled and the reason for his behavior should be made public for other parents to understand their mistakes. The incident is disturbing for us as a society also. We are so much detached to our children to understand and aware of things going inside their innocent minds.
He is anyway a child. Does he understand what he did? Is giving any punishment to him solve the purpose? His thoughts must be scrutinized and the issue must be dealt sensibility. We should have cordial relationship with our children to know them fully. I am not a parent but still hurt and disturbed from this news and knew many like me would be concerned with this incident. This is a warning sign and we must take it seriously to know where we are going wrong as a parent, school and society.
