The UN outfit said that imparting sex education must be made mandatory in schools.
A statement by officials of the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) might not go down well with the Karnataka government, which appears to be hell bent on not allowing imparting of sex education to school students in classrooms.
Senior members of UNICEF on Wednesday slammed the Karnataka government’s decision to put on hold the Adolescence Education Programme — a euphemism for sex education — across the state.
A senior UNICEF official, while attending a state-level consultation on ‘Adolescent Children and Their Issues’, said that HIV/AIDS posed a great threat to current generation of adolescents.
“We cannot shy away from reality. Adolescents around the world are engaging themselves in sexual relationships. They risk getting infected with HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases, if they lack awareness. Moreover, girl children are at the risk of having unwanted pregnancies. In such a scenario, sex education should be mandatory,” said the Unicef official, who did not wish to be named.
He added that Karnataka should not have any problem in introducing the subject in the classrooms, when neighbouring states like Andhra Pradesh were equipping adolescents with better and safer sexual practices.
A proposal to impart sex education in schools as part of anti-AIDS course had been rejected outright by Karnataka. Although the subject is ‘taboo’ for government schools, many private schools in the state are imparting sex education by holding seminars and short-term courses for students.
Moreover, UNICEF has a special link-up programme, where adolescent school dropouts are given lessons in sex education across the country.
Every year UNICEF brings out “State of the World’s Children” report on specific issues related to children. The theme of this year’s report is adolescents.
In the backdrop of the report, Karnataka Child Rights Observatory (KCRO), a voluntary organisation working for child rights, hosted Wednesday’s consultation programme. Experts in health, education, protection and development of adolescents took part in the event.
As part of the day-long consultation programme, issues ranging from nutrition and health, child marriages, disability prevention and development, right to education, HIV/AIDS, substance abuse, stress and suicide and trafficking among adolescents were discussed at length.
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