Sex education can save lives

[Guest guest]

Sex education can save lives

THE Indian adolescent is no different from young people in other countries in

his sexual curiosity and half-baked knowledge about sex and its dos and don’ts.

Today, more than ever before, young people are seduced by sex. It is all

pervasive – on TV channels that hawk entertainment, fashion and the most

salacious music videos. Magazines, journals and even newspapers thrive on sex.

A picture of a seductive woman invariably gets special position. Macho men and

the metro-sexual look has them scurrying to beauty parlours to get fair and

beautiful.

Yet some right wing politicians and fundamentalists believe that Indian youth

are different – they will indulge in sexual relationships only after marriage.

So eight states – Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Rajasthan,

Kerala, Chattisgarh and Goa have banned sex education, while Uttar Pradesh and

Bihar are considering a ban.

In Jharkhand a youth policy is being finalised. A morality debate has begun

between educators who maintain that sexuality education will reduce the spread

of HIV and other sexually-transmitted infections and critics who fear it will

corrupt young minds.

Both UNICEF and NACO have been blamed for their “overzealous push” for sex

education and for the content of the school manuals brought out by them.

Concerned about the set back to the years of efforts to educate youth about sex,

sexuality and reproductive health, a group of NGOs who have years of experience

in youth health education have got together under the National Alliance for

Young People Towards a Healthy Future to salvage the situation.

In fact, at the fourth Asia Pacific Conference on Reproductive and Sexual Health

at Hyderabad later in October, there will be a whole session on the issue with

several countries of south Asia like Pakistan, Bangladesh and Malaysia

participating. Adolescence sexual education is in fact not new in the country.

It has been part of the school curriculum for several years but under different

names. In 1980, ‘Population Education’ which dealt with issues related to

increase in population, started in schools with UN support. It was implemented

as part of the National Population Education Project of the NCERT. In 1993 it

changed to ‘Adolescence Education’ to address reproductive and sexual health

issues along with HIV and AIDS as well as substance abuse.

This again was launched as a country wide programme of the NCERT. In 2001 it

became a wholly government programme termed, ‘Population and Development

Education Programmes’. Finally in the Tenth Plan it was accepted as ‘Adolescence

education for life skills development’.

Presently two UN-supported programmes are going on simultaneously - one a

UNICEF/NACO programme earlier under the Health Ministry and the other a

UNFPA/CBSE-NCERT programme. Some governments, like Delhi, have collaborated with

NACO and UNICEF to develop their own

modules.

The NACO/UNICEF module that seeks to impart sexual education in an upfront,

direct manner rather than subtly is what has triggered off the current

controversy. Yet, the National Family Health Surveys II and III reveals that

young people who form 30 per cent of the population, are sexually active at 12

and 13 years. NFHS II shows that fifty per cent of young women are estimated to

be sexually active by 18 years; 57 per cent of the girls are married before they

are 18 and 52 per cent have their first pregnancy between 15 and 19 years.

Significantly, 35 per cent of all reported HIV infections are among those in the

15 to 24 age group.

This clearly shows that education on sex and sexuality is extremely important.

The Population Council’s 2004-2005 in-depth survey of intimate interactions

between unmarried young women and men in the 15 to 24 age group in Pune district

of Maharashtra also shows that one in five men and a little less than one in 20

women have

premarital sex.

Urban youngsters are more sexually active than those in rural areas. The study

breaks the myth of sex taking place largely within marriage in conservative

Indian society and argues for inclusion of unmarried young people in the

country’s reproductive health programmes. “Counselling and contraceptive

services must be offered in a non-judgemental and confidential manner to all

young people,” says Shireen Jejeebhoy who has carried out the study with Rajib

Acharya.

Resentment against the sex education programme is being fanned by a few right

wing organisations and individuals like former HRD Minister Murli Manohar Joshi

asserting that sex education is a “foreign conspiracy by international NGOs to

get money under the guise of AIDS control and education.” They argue that Indian

youth do not require sex education.

It is true that there are a few graphic pictures and some distasteful text in

modules and the teacher’s work book that are in use, but we cannot afford to

throw out the baby with the bath water. Efforts are on to rework the manuals and

work books, making them culturally sensitive and acceptable to urban and rural

middle class.

In fact separate modules are needed keeping in mind the sensitivity of people in

different states and regions. Teachers’ training in imparting adolescence

education for life skills needs to be more thorough. Sixteen hours of

co-curricular activities related to adolescence education in a school year is

mandatory and teachers need to be prepared for it. They should also be

compensated for it.

In Gujarat and Jharkhand, under the guise of training, 60 to 70 teachers were

packed in a large hall for a few hours and the material given to them with

scarcely any explanation.

For some it became a junket where the collected two days TA/DA for a few hours

of training. Even the quality of training imparted by NACO to master trainers

has been questioned.

In contrast sex education is continuing in those states that have taken the

trouble to improve the quality of their teacher training programmes. Grassroots

experience shows that longer training period of three to five days are essential

to change mindsets.

Without it there could be a knee jerk reaction that this is pornographic

material. In Jharkhand for instance, there was a complete turnabout in attitudes

after the regular two-hour teacher-training programme was converted into a

residential course with the help of an NGO.

It is equally important that parents of school children should be taken into

confidence about adolescence education for life skills. Teachers as well as

parents have to understand that times are changing. In a world where sex and

sexuality is all pervasive, you cannot have an ostrich-like attitude.

It is better to prepare the young for the pleasures as well as dangers of

intimate relationships. It is better to play safe than be sorry.

http://www.tribuneindia.com/2007/20071022/edit.htm