Article Source : Deccan Herald, Bangalore

Author : Ila Hukku

Date of Issue : Apr 5 2004

Title of Article : Speak up for children

Details : We who have a vote, we who make policies or influence opinion, should speak up for underprivileged children Karnataka, after Rajasthan, has the largest drought-prone area in India. Children are the worst affected as successive years of drought have left millions reeling from starvation, ill health and underemployment. Infant and maternal mortality rates are on the rise due to shortage of food and water. Increasing adult unemployment and loss of traditional occupations like cattle rearing as a result of prolonged drought expose children to many risks. Instances of children being pushed into work or prostitution abound. Experts say that droughts are predictable and with planning it is possible to relieve if not prevent misery. Yet to this day, neither Karnataka nor India has a long-term strategy on how to tackle drought and have no plans to evolve them. Isn't this shocking considering that all political parties seem to have "development" as the common agenda for the elections? A closer examination of "development" in India throws up some alarming statistics. Sixty million children under the age of 6 live below the poverty line and every second child in the country is malnourished. More than half of our children suffer from diarrhoea and more than 50% do not receive re-hydration treatment. Almost half of India's children do not get immunised against DPT, measles and tuberculosis. Poor accessibility India has one of the most privatised health care systems. The Government expenditure on health declined from 1.3% of the GDP in 1990 to 0.9% in 1999. This has led to poor accessibility and quality of services provided by the Government health care system. The poor have no choice but to use private health services even at a huge cost. In more than 40% of hospitalisation episodes, the costs are met through the sale of assets or by taking loans. Increasing commercialisation of health services places an undue financial burden on poor families. Further, the Government health programmes are disease specific rather than promoting community health care. This lack of focus on community awareness has led to failures in disease-oriented campaigns like the Pulse Polio one. Poverty, lack of health facilities, abuse and barriers like those of caste, gender, ethnicity and disability can be transcended by good quality education. But less than half of India's children between the age 6 and 14 go to school and a little over one-third of all children who enrol in grade one reach grade eight. Poor quality teaching in Government schools continues to be a major reason for high dropout rate at the primary level. The overall public expenditure on education dropped from a peak of 4.4% of national income in 1989 to 2.75% in 1998-99. Towards the latter part of the 90s the Government of India's programming on education indicates a backing off from the commitment to provide quality education to all. The unequal access to quality education is worsening as the Government system moves towards delivering substandard education to the very children who need quality education the most. Through the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan, under-qualified and under-paid teachers will impart education to several million first generation learners. Thus segregated, these children will be handicapped in competing with those educated in formal schools and will find it impossible to break the chains of poverty. The most disadvantaged: the girls, those with disabilities, the dalits and adivasis will be those who end up being provided with such second-rate education. False claims? Can a nation claim to have made significant progress even as her children remain uneducated, unhealthy and hungry? If development is the real agenda of India today then we need to concentrate on strengthening the foundations. A few crucial investments on children can form this bedrock. We need to: (1) Ensure a universal definition of "child" to include all persons under the age of 18.(2) Increase Government expenditure on children. (3) Specifically increase expenditure on education to 10% and health to 5% of the GDP.(4) Enrol and retain all children in the age group of 6-18 years in formal, full-time schools that provide quality education. All children below 6 years should be in anganwadis. (5) The Government should ensure that all children complete schooling up to Class 10. (6) Guarantee complete prohibition on all forms of child labour across sectors. (7) Revise the National Policy for Children (1974) to make it comprehensive and in line with the Constitution and the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. (8) Establish a National Commission for Children with statutory powers. The promises made to India's children 57 years ago remain unfulfilled. Elections are around the corner and politicians and policy-makers are gauging public sentiment. India's children need each of us "we who have a vote, who determine policies and influence opinion "to speak up in their name. The writer is Director, Development Support, Child Relief and You (CRY)