Call to ban corporal punishment

ISHWAR RAUNIYAR KATHMANDU, JULY 15

Seventeen different organizations submitted a memorandum on Wednesday to the Ministry of Education asking for legal ban over corporal punishment. The memorandum calls for "prohibition of physical and psychological tortures to the students…teachers found guilty should be punished according to the law." The organisations have launched a campaign to submit a memorandum on the 15th of every month until the government meets their demands. Last month, Rojina Lamichhane and Prashna Sharma, both grade 10 students at Prashanti Siksha Sadan at Kapan, Kathmandu, were beaten up by their principal, and were admitted in Om hospital for treatment. Their crime was that they ate in the 'canteen', which was against the rules. In a similar incident last year, Hittan Ramjali, a grade nine student, was beaten up by three teachers of Tripureshwor Secondary School. He was blamed for leaking the air out of his teacher's cycle. After the beating, he disappeared for 11 days, and was later found dead. Psychologist Ganga Pathak shared one such incident. She said, "A boy was forced to write 'I am a cheater, I am a liar' a hundred times because he didn't do the homework. The boy was depressed for many weeks after that. Most schools in the Valley mete out corporal punishment to students." However, Dr. Bidhyanath Koirala, lecturer at Tribhuvan University, thinks parents are responsible as well for such incidents. He said, "Parents shouldn't use physically hit their children." He said there are two types of such teachers: those who were themselves beaten up when they were young, and those who enjoy such beatings. Koirala also said, "Students are of two types as well: one, who are pampered at home and need to be controlled, and the other who are physically abused at home