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By Sushmita Malaviya Recent data from NFHS-III reveals that an overwhelming majority of Indians feel their children should be taught about sexual behaviour and HIV/AIDS in school. Nevertheless, Uttar Pradesh, with the country’s highest infant mortality rate and high maternal mortality and fertility rates, has chosen to ban its very successful Adolescent Education Programme in schools across the state
First some numbers. According to the 2001 census, about 51.68% of Uttar Pradesh’s population is in the 15-59 age-group. According to the Sample Registration Survey (SRS) 2004, Uttar Pradesh’s total fertility rate is 4.4, as against the country’s 2.9. SRS 2001-2003 showed that the state’s Maternal Mortality Rate (MMR) was 517, as against the country’s 315. Infant Mortality Rate (IMR) in UP is still the highest in India at 73 for every 1,000 live births. IMR in rural areas (where literacy levels are lower) is nearly twice as high as in urban areas. Children in rural areas experience an 80% greater risk of dying before their fifth birthday than do urban children. Nearly two-thirds of infant deaths occur during the neonatal period. IMR is found to decline sharply with an increase in the mother’s education levels. IMR is as high as 127 per 1,000 for infants born to illiterate women, compared to an IMR as low as 55 per 1,000 with literate women. Infant mortality is highest for children of mothers under 20 years and above 40 years. It is also found that child spacing patterns play a powerful part in the child’s chances of survival. Infant mortality is well over three times as high for children with a preceding interval of less than 24 months as for children with a preceding interval of 48 months or more. According to the Uttar Pradesh Network of Positive People (UPNP) 40% of HIV-positive people in Uttar Pradesh are below 25 years of age. These facts should be sufficient to illustrate the importance of adolescent education or life skills education, or sexuality education, call it what you will. Data from the National Family Health Survey III, released in 2007, revealed that 80% of men think that school-going boys and girls should learn about HIV/AIDS, compared with 63% of women. More than 60% of men say that both boys and girls should be taught about sex and sexual behaviour in school; but less than 50% of women feel that this is an appropriate topic to be taught in schools. Nevertheless, following the furore over the suitability or otherwise of “sex education” in schools in more than six Indian states, all of which have banned the subject at the school level this year, sexuality education has been withdrawn from schools under the Uttar Pradesh Board as well. The state’s Director of Education passed an order to this effect. An all-party meeting called by legislative assembly Chairman Sukhram Singh Yadav decided to summon the officer who presented “obscene syllabus” in the name of AIDS awareness! Over the past few years, the state education department had been running a life-skills-based Adolescent Education Programme (AEP) hoping to arm adolescents with information on how to deal with day-to-day situations. The hope was that with this knowledge, young people would be able to safeguard themselves and their immediate family and community against preventable health disasters. The education department runs the AEP with support from the Uttar Pradesh State AIDS Control Society (UPSACS), and Uttar Pradesh’s State Council for Education Research and Training (SCERT), which prepared the curriculum. Agencies like Unicef and the National AIDS Control Organisation (NACO) provided their expertise in shaping the course material for schools. The material evolved over a decade and was adapted, changed and tested in a number of states. It was also reviewed by teachers, the SCERT, District Institutes of Education and Training (DIET) and National Council for Education Research and Training (NCERT) at the national level, before being translated into Hindi. In Uttar Pradesh, the material was field-tested by training a number of district resource persons. Teachers were taught to use tools to enable them to provide information on life skills; one section details information on HIV. NCERT’s information on HIV/AIDS was introduced as a chapter in books from the Uttar Pradesh Board. The Department of Secondary Education first received the go-ahead for the inclusion of AIDS awareness in the syllabus on August 16, 2005. This was followed by a reminder issued on September 8, 2005. A special committee comprising members of the social sciences, physical education and sports (there are 37 specialised textbook committees) committees held an urgent meeting to approve the material to be taught. The new curriculum on AIDS education evolved in consultation with experts and teachers. Around 2,000 schools in Uttar Pradesh taught the AEP in the last academic year, and the response from students was extremely satisfactory. A government school principal in Lucknow (who did not want to be named) says: “For the past two years, we have been teaching ‘Kishor Awastha’ and I know that my students have benefited from the knowledge they have gained.” Most of the children at his school, he adds, are from the lower middle class and poorer sections of society. “These children do not get proper information about health and hygiene from their parents or from others in their community. In such a situation there are many questions that adolescents have that remain unanswered.” The two sessions that his school conducted helped bridge this gap. A biology teacher points out: “I have always been reluctant to teach human anatomy, which is part of the school syllabus. However, the AEP participatory training method has helped me overcome my hesitation.” Initial rumblings against the AEP began on July 4, 2007 when schools in the state reopened after the summer vacation. By July 6, the issue of life skills education for adolescents was being discussed by the Opposition in the state Vidhan Sabha, and a virulent attack was launched against the programme. BJP MLA Hukum Singh called it a “corrupting influence”, another senior BJP member Om Prakash Singh demanded to know the logic behind imparting sexual knowledge in a state where co-education was still taboo. During a furore in the legislative assembly, politicians came up with standard statements about the culture of the country being affected, and the presence of a “foreign” hand. The principal in Lucknow points out that the programme was introduced in his school only after he had called a parent-teacher meeting and held several meetings on the issue. This was part of state-level advocacy where students and teachers presented their response to the AEP programme. During these interactions, there was no opposition to the programme. Adolescent education was introduced in UP during 2005-2006 when two lessons were incorporated into the social sciences and physical education curriculum for Classes IX to XII. This year, when the Uttar Pradesh Secondary Education Board made the Kishor Awastha Shiksha Yojana (Adolescent Education Programme), aimed primarily at AIDS awareness among adolescents, compulsory from the 2007-08 session, teachers threatened a mass boycott. The new lessons, a set of four, were based on material provided by NACO and the Ministry of Human Resource and Development. Among the many interviews carried in the local media when the controversy broke, there were some with adolescents and their parents who said they wanted systematic and formal information dissemination. Most said this was necessary especially in a world that is witnessing an information explosion with adolescents being exposed to adult life much earlier than previous generations. Whether it’s pocket money, use of a mobile phone, permission to socialise, withdrawal of parental supervision – many parents feel adolescents need to make an informed choice rather than learning by trial and error. To equip them to handle puberty and adulthood, isn’t knowledge about sex necessary too, they ask. Teachers opposed to the AEP believe that CBSE, ICSE and ISC schools can teach their children about safe sex and condoms because they are located in cities and students who go to these schools are exposed to these things through the media. “One must understand the problem a teacher faces in talking about sex in a class in remote villages,” says one teacher who does not wish to be named. Some of the arguments appear contradictory. Teachers say the material will be embarrassing for girl students, even though most schools do not have co-education. Although the state government withdrew the controversial lesson on HIV/AIDS from the Class IX and XI curricula of the Uttar Pradesh Board for High School and Intermediate Education for review on July 10 (the following day, teachers handed over the training material to senior education officials), the teachers association had already decided, on July 8, that on July 21 and 30 they would burn books outside the offices of the District Inspectors Of Schools (DIOS) and the Uttar Pradesh Board. In his order dated July 17, Sanjay Mohan, director, secondary education, instructed all joint directors and DIOS to ask school principals and teachers not to refer to the Kishor Awastha material in schools. Even as the government decided it would remove any controversial words from the textbooks and provide standard material to all publishers on life skills in general, not just HIV, secondary teachers around the state burnt books to register their protest, as planned, on July 21. Protests against the AEP actually began much before July this year. Uttar Pradesh Madhyamik Shikshak Sangh (UPMSS), Lucknow Chapter, President Dr R P Mishra and Pradhancharya Parisad’s Dr Dhananjay Gupta voiced their opposition to the programme during the initial stages, when the curriculum was being framed. The teachers group in the legislative council, led by O P Sharma, backed a protest by school principals and office-bearers of teachers unions. Sharma claims the teaching community was not taken into confidence whilst changing the syllabus, allegations that make little sense given that the programme was rolled out over 2005-07. Interestingly, nowhere in the material that the children study have the words “sex education” been used. Still, these words are repeatedly being used by teachers associations to create misconceptions and mislead the media. Although some newspapers stated that the Class IX and XI books were loaded with highly objectionable content, the protests actually began over the AEP teachers’ facilitation book. According to the executive director of Naz Foundation International’s regional office Arif Jafar there have been cases where youngsters below 19 years of age have become HIV-positive. “This shows that youngsters are sexually active but may or may not be using protection.” Another important issue that experts bring up is that students in rural areas have limited places to access proper information. Thus, both urban and rural students tend to go to quacks who make money by exploiting their ignorance. A study by a private agency in selected districts of Uttar Pradesh found that the average age of sexual initiation is now 15 years. Add to this the fact that around 64% of girls get married by the age of 18. AIDS Awareness Centre for Counselling, Education and Training (AACCET) coordinator Sonika Bhatia says a programme begun by the Isabella Thoburn College to empower college girls to speak about themselves, their desires and their ambitions has given the college the strength to stand up to the protests. Girls are often silent. They do not speak, they do not know whom to discuss their problems with, how to deal with peer pressure, how to deal with changing emotions, menstruation, etc. “If they have such concerns, they need to be counselled without people judging them,” says Bhatia. She adds that girls, especially, need to learn how to cope with what marriage entails. “Many girls believe that marriage is a fairytale. Many do not have any knowledge about contraception, fertility and infertility.” Bhatia explains that the college invites doctors to come and speak to the girls on these issues. Adolescence is about change, and with this change comes the desire to know about sexuality. Providing life skills at this point is immensely important. Since AACCET was set up in 2002, Bhatia has dealt with hundreds of students. She says: “If people think that students do not discuss sexuality, they are mistaken. From condoms to sex -- name an issue, the students are discussing it.” Returning to the book that has kicked off the recent controversy, Bhatia says she has seen the manual. “It is a facilitation book. It is for the teachers to subtly and suitably interpret, then convey the matter to their students. It is to equip teachers with adequate information to be confident enough to deal with the range of adolescent issues,” she says. (Sushmita Malaviya is an activist and researcher on developmental issues. She is based in Lucknow) InfoChange News & Features, October 2007 |
