The scope of online education has made a paradigm change after March 2020 COVID Pandemic. This not so new system of education has limited access to a few privileged kids who could afford a mobile and an active internet connection to their disposal.

The study was conducted by the Caritas India partners, Right to Education Forum and Campaign Against Child Labour to access the status of child rights in West Bengal during the lockdown period amid COVID 19 outbreak.

When the country was shut into Lockdown caused by COVID 19, pandemic, little did we know that this would create a major impact on the Rights of Children.

The survey was conducted by West Bengal and Campaign against Child Labour (CACL) and Right to Education Forum (RTE Forum) — covering 2,154 children and their families including 173 differently-abled children across 19 districts of West Bengal through 32 organisations members of WB CACL and RtE forum.

On 24th August 2020, Report on Rapid Assessment on the Status of Child Rights in WB was released through the virtual platform in the presence of Ms. Ananya Chakraborty (Chairperson, West Bengal Commission for Protection of Child Rights), lauded the efforts of both the forum and strongly put forward her view that this study would, help policymakers in framing policy. This report surely can act as a Policy influencer that we can take at the national level. She said though “I haven’t gone through the report yet. Once I get the reports only then I will be able to comment on it more. “

The highlights of the study showcased that 71% of kids have no access to digital education. Seventeen per cent of the surveyed children made do with on one or two meals a day, and 11 per cent of the sick could not access any medical treatment. Only 21.5 per cent of children from lower classes had access to online education at the pre-primary and primary level while the percentage for those from higher socio-economic background stood at 53.2 per cent at the higher secondary level.

“At least Bengal’s data is better than the national data. Across India, only 14 per cent of the school children have been able to continue their education,” said Prabir Basu, Joint Convener of RTE Forum (Campaign).

Ambarish Rai (National Convener, Right to Education Forum), strongly spoke on child stress due to the consequences of COVID 19 and increase school dropout, increasing child labour. ‘Online education system and its Transformation of education system need critical review. Resource allocation must be made mandatory, the functionality of the school management committee and formalizing education system by bringing trained and qualified teachers were some of his suggestion. He ended by saying that ‘ We want education as RIGHT and not as a CHARITY ‘.

CSOs increased vigil in coercing those diluting child / human rights. Pushing monitoring mechanisms – CWCs, DCPUs and child rights commissions, Mid-Day meals to function better were resonated strongly by Mr. Mathew Philip (National Convener, Campaign Against Child Labour) and collectivization of efforts of CSOs and putting pressure and need for safe education plan for COVID response was resounded by Ms Kamal Gaur – Director Education Save the Children

“The end result of the report is very disturbing, I would say practically the scenario is even worse. The survey has been done with children residing in the areas with the presence of organisations to support them… We would like to bring it to the notice of the state government so that the policymakers can strategize to improve the situation,” said the Convenor WB Campaign and Child Labour.

“This study has shown us stark realities of children during the lockdown and the need for relooking government policies, digital education is not the alternative, need to provide education in persons and more so for special children”, shared Asha Ekka, Caritas India State Manager for West Bengal. “Greater responsibility and empowering of school management committees, strengthening the existing Child Protection systems and make them functional, Establishment of CWCs in West Bengal, Mapping of Child Labour Hotspots”, proposed Asha.

The study came with major recommendations in the field of Education, protection, health and nutrition.

EDUCATION

• Digital education is creating a large social divide within children and their families, depriving the majority of children from their right to free and compulsory education; the government should recognize this an important issue and make plans to include all children within the school education system on an equitable basis.
• Digital education is not an option for the children of our state. Education has to be imparted in person, particularly for children up to 18 years of age.
• Special measures need to be taken for children with disabilities, displaced children of migrant labours and children who are otherwise socially disadvantaged.
• The education system needs to be empathetic, embracing introducing evaluation systems that discover the abilities in the children undermining their lapses.
• The education system needs to involve the communities by way of the School Management Committee.
• This is the time when community participation, the participation of mothers of children in running schools has become crucial. The teaching fraternity, parents and community members have to work together to ensure that every child is included in the education system.
• The SMC can play an important role in creating awareness regarding safety and hygiene in schools and among children and involve in building infrastructure and necessary arrangements for health-hygiene with the guideline to save the children from COVID-19 in school.

PROTECTION

• Prevent children from dropping out of school by encouraging them to stay in school and by ensuring their learning outcome.
• Special attention must be given to girl children’s access to education and learning outcome to prevent their drop out.
• Regular meetings with parents to encourage them to send children to school and be aware of their child’s progress.
• Ensure livelihood of the guardians to stop child marriage, trafficking and child labour. Economic crisis will deepen and the Govt. should address the needs of these families through a protection mechanism at different levels and must act with sensitivity and be proactive.

HEALTH

• Necessary Arrangement to ensure Regular immunization of all children.
• Special drive to locate those children who did not receive immunization support during the lockdown period and provide them with necessary immunization.

NUTRITION

• A large number of children received some form of support through PDS, Mid-Day Meal and ICDS Centres. But the fact remains that almost 1/5 of the children did not get enough food to eat during this period. Measures should be taken by Strengthening Public distribution system, Anganwadi supplementary food distribution system and Mid-day meal distribution system.