Enforce corporal punishment law
We were taught at school that God is supreme and that he loves children. Regrettably, it was literally beaten-in to us during my school-going days, which I found very difficult to comprehend. Countless times I asked myself, if Allah loves us why is he allowing teachers to beat us?
All these years later and now a father of two lovely school-going boys, I still read horrific stories in the papers about less-fortunate children being subjected to corporal punishment by school teachers and I can’t understand why. Every teacher in the land should be aware of its wicked wrongdoing, thanks in most part to the long-running anti corporal punishment campaign by Sir Frank Peters in which he accentuates all the dangers to the children and to society.
I read an interesting newspaper report of his recently in which he refutes the long-time practiced adage, ‘spare the rod, and spoil the child’. Most people over the decades came to accept that the word ‘rod’ meant stick or bamboo used to beat children into submission and discipline.
Sir Frank, however, points out its true meaning was lost in translation. That ‘rod’ is the shepherd’s crook/staff to guide the sheep and not to damage them. That is logical and God-like thinking. What farmer/shepherd would want to damage his stock and lower their sales value?
The common cry from Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and Education Minister Nurul Islam Nahid (and many more) is that the ‘children are our future’. So why allow our most valuable asset to be damaged? Shouldn’t those who damage them or block their development be punished and seen for what they are, enemies of the state? Or is that the first duty of the next government?
Banning corporal punishment in schools, as did Md. Justice Ali and Md. Justice Sheikh Hasan Arif in 2011, just isn’t enough. The law needs to be rigorously enforced.
Eng. Fakrul Onoy
Uttara,
Dhaka
