Girl Child Research Paper

GIRL CHILD ABUSE HINDERS THE DEVELOPMENT OF INDIA

Peddineni Parvathi

(Lecturer in English, Government College for Women, Guntur.)

Girl Child Abuse is a common phenomenon observed in India in different cultural milieu and socio-economic situations. There is no question of “Human Rights” in the case of Girl Child. A universal definition of child abuse in the Indian context does not exist and has yet to be defined. But it is related to the treatment the girl child repeatedly with cruelty and violence damaging the physical, emotional, economical, sexual and social state of the girl child who is below the age of eighteen. In India, as in many other countries, child abuse is a prevalent phenomenon in the name of “Child Protection” and the national

WHO estimates that almost 53,000 child deaths in 2002 were due to child homicide. In the Global School-Based Student Health Survey carried out in a wide range of developing countries, between 20% and 65% of school going children reported having been verbally or physically bullied in school in the previous 30 days. Similar rates of bullying have been found in industrialized countries. An estimated 150 million girls and 73 million boys under 18 have experienced forced sexual intercourse or other forms of sexual violence involving physical contact. UNICEF estimates that in sub-Saharan Africa, Egypt and Sudan, 3 million girls and women are subjected to FGM every year. ILO estimates that 218 million children were involved in child labour in 2004, of which 126 million were engaged in hazardous work. Estimates from 2000 suggest that 5.7 million were in forced or bonded labour, 1.8 million in prostitution and pornography and 1.2 million were victims of

According to the report published in 2005 on 'Trafficking in Women and Children in India', 44,476 children were reported missing in India, out of which 11,008 children continued to remain untraced. India is the major source and destination country for trafficked children from within India and adjoining countries. Ministry of Women and child development, Government of India, made a study on child abuse in 2007 and presented a report and its major findings are: It has very clearly emerged that across different kinds of abuse, it is young children, in the 5-12 year group, who are most at risk of abuse and exploitation.

PHYSICAL ABUSE

1. Two out of every three children were physically abused.

2. Out of 69% children physically abused in 13 sample states, 54.68% were boys.

3. Over 50% children in all the 13 sample states were being subjected to one or the other form of

4. physical abuse.

5. Out of those children physically abused in family situations, 88.6% were physically abused