Indian schools finally wake up to a necessity - sex education

They might be doing it, but do they know what they're doing? As cable TV, music videos and the Net casually toss erotica right into our homes, Indian schools are finally waking up to a necessity - sex education."If I kiss my girlfriend, will she get pregnant?" asks 12-year-old Suresh Reddy, a Class VIII student, during one such lesson in a Hyderabad school. Najma Kazi, 14 and a student of Class X, is a shade more tentative. "What is the right age to have sex?" she inquires.Kazi is lucky she has someone to turn to. But in schools across the country, the opposition is coming from many quarters - from squeamish teachers who think sex education is the biology instructor's business, and parents fearing that knowledge will lead their children astray.Binaifer Bharucha, a counsellor with several Mumbai schools, recalls the first time she demonstrated the use of a condom in a class in 1992. "We got an amazingly positive feedback from students, but the principal and teachers were aghast."They're obviously out of sync with the younger generation, for as Kalindi Majumdar, former vice-principal at the Nirmala Niketan College of Social Work, points out: "We are not putting ideas into the minds of children. The ideas are already there."Amused by their hesitant parents, many youngsters have formulated their own three-point programme: ask friends, read books, surf the Net. Fortunately, the AIDS scare of the '90s has shaken at least some schools out of their stupor.Mumbai was the pioneer, but other cities are joining in. Four years ago, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) began a programme with 51 schools. Today over 200 private and aided schools have been roped in, and sex-education classes are likely to be made mandatory for all BMC-controlled schools.There are a great deal of questions children need to ask. Says H.N. Pal, principal, Sir J.J. Girl's School in Mumbai: "The students of the '90s are very mature, with a healthy attitude towards sexuality. They can discuss pre-marital sex, unwanted pregnancies and abortion quite openly in class." All they need then is a responsible adult who thinks it's okay they ask.Published By: AtMigration Published On: Sep 21, 1998--- ENDS ---

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Indian schools finally wake up to a necessity - sex education

They might be doing it, but do they know what they're doing? As cable TV, music videos and the Net casually toss erotica right into our homes, Indian schools are finally waking up to a necessity - sex education.

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