Karnataka: Unicef programme invites 145;obscene146; tag

A three-year-old UNICEF-National AIDS Control Organisation funded 8216;Life Skills Development8217; programme for students in 9373 high schools has run into trouble in Karnataka.

A three-year-old UNICEF-National AIDS Control Organisation funded 8216;Life Skills Development8217; programme for students in 9373 high schools has run into trouble in Karnataka. With protests rising over some of the material used to train teachers and the role-play activities outlined for students in the programme, the state government is now threatening to pull the shutters on what it calls the 8220;school sex education programme8221;.

The programme 8212; also called the 8216;Adolescent Education Programme8217; 8212; was conceived to equip students in 9th and 10th standards with life skills needed to understand and handle the pressures of their sexual maturity.

8220;While knowledge on HIV/AIDS was a crucial part of the programme, it also focused on handling peer pressures, media pressure and coping with sexual changes and behaviour8221;, says a former UNICEF coordinator for the programme.

With a large number of students in government schools dropping out by 7th standard, a proposal has also been doing the rounds for implementation of the programme from the 6th or 7th standard onward.

However, trouble began in the second week of March when the All-India Democratic Students8217; Organisation AIDSO and the All-India Mahila Samskruthika Sanghatane AIMSS called it an experiment with young minds and demanded withdrawal of the programme.

Karnataka8217;s Primary Education Minister Basavaraj Horatti, already at the heart of several school-related controversies in the state, has now jumped in the fray and says he will stop the programme.

8220;I don8217;t see any link between high school students and HIV. What they need at this stage is moral education and not sex education. I saw that some of the material being used for the programme are very obscene. After it was brought to my notice, I have stayed the implementation of the programme,8221; Horatti told The Indian Express.

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The minister said he would consider allowing the programme to continue after a meeting on April 10 with teachers, parents, child psychologists, doctors, representatives of the state AIDS prevention society and UNICEF.

Since 2003, when it began, as many as 16,000 teachers specifically chosen for their popularity with their wards have been trained to impart the 8216;life skills8217; programme. After it was field-tested by UNICEF in 2003, it was handed over to the state education department to implement with the technical expertise of the Health department.

Curiously, an assessment carried out for 2006-07 by Bangalore University with funding from UNICEF showed that 93 per cent of teachers, 90 per cent of students and 87 per cent of parents found it 8220;age appropriate and useful for life skills development8221;.

8220;It is really sad that it has been labelled a sex education programme and is being threatened,8221; an official of the Karnataka State AIDS Prevention Society, said.

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Some of the objections to the programme are over the use of charts to depict sexual organs and role-play activities.

In one of the activities, a boy asks a girl to dance with him to symbolise physical union and the girl makes the boy wear a condom cap. In another, students enact AIDS affliction and ways to avoid it.

8220;The charts are meant for teachers not the children. There is a lot of misconception about the programme,8221; says M Nataraj, a UNICEF coordinator.