Among numerous disheartening stories and a drastic rise in child abuse cases our volunteer, Sidra Virk found a heartwarming story regarding three children (two girls and a boy). In the upshot of Farishta case, students of University of Management and Technology (UMT) with the help of Center for Human Rights and Justice (CHRJ) arranged an awareness session and silent protest to end Child Abuse in Pakistan. Students pledged to spread awareness among children in their families, their neighborhoods, regarding ‘good touch’ and ‘bad touch’. They also pledged to educate young parents on how to look for signs of abuse in their child’s behavior.
The tools and tactics used in this process were designed by a dedicated volunteer of the Center, Ms. Maira Asif.
Following this, CHRJ’s volunteers conducted awareness sessions for young parents and children amongst their relatives, friends, and acquaintances, to help the community combat the menace of child abuse.
Following is Sidra’s account:
“On the night before Eid (commonly referred to as Chaand Raat), I returned home at approx. 11pm from shopping with my family. My house is located at a Chowk (Crossroads), and my mother saw two girls and a boy standing in front of our gate. The two girls were roughly 9 & 7 years old, and the boy was around 10 years old.
The girls were crying and the boy started crying as well when my mother approached them and asked what they were doing here, the boy narrated the situation as follows: “the mother of both girls had gone out for some shopping and had advised the girls to stay inside their home. But, the girls became scared since there was nobody home with them, and their father was a drug addict. He used to come home late, and thus they decided to leave their home.
The most touching thing the young boy said was “some days ago a baji (older sister, a term of reverence for young lady) came to our house and explained how children are often victims of bad crimes in Pakistan, and said we should not go outside without any elder with us. These two are my neighbors and they are asking me to take them to their mom, but I am also a child what if someone catches me and does bad things to me? I am telling them to go inside their house and wait for their mom, but they are not listening to me”.
My mother asked the girls to stay at our house as standing alone outside was not safe, but the boy was skeptical about this too. He asked whether the girls would be safe inside our house, whether there were any bad men there or not, and whether leaving them with my mother would be safe or not. Upon assurance, the boy left the girls with us."
This is just one amongst others of an inspiring success story of social change. The sense of responsibility the boy demonstrated at such a young age, as a result of just one awareness session is remarkable. It shows that we need to spread awareness about issues which plague our society, instead of tabooing them. We should speak up for change, it may be slow, but it will come one step at a time.
It is about time we start taking action and teaching children how to identify abuse, set their bodily boundaries, provide them safe spaces for confiding in and stop victim shaming.
We have created 2 manuals
1) For awareness purposes
-loopholes in law (rape of only woman is recognized by our law), myths about child abuse etc
2) How parents need to discuss children's safety with them
Manuals Child Abuse Awareness and Protection
We, at CHRJ, urge everyone to download the manuals, read them, understand them and discuss this with their relatives, family, and friends. We encourage our young followers to look for evil in our society and to raise their voice against it. We need to join our efforts and unite against all social evils which are corrupting the very fabric of our community.
#CHRJ #UniteForChange #KnowYourRights #SpeakUpAgainstEvil
#FightAgainstChildAbuse #ProtectOurChildren #StopChildAbuse
