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Safeguarding Child Rights in the Digital Landscape*

The Pandemic and Social Distancing: Dawn of Online Education in India

When the pandemic set in, everything came to a standstill. For the first few days, people couldn’t even imagine the magnitude of change it would bring with itself. The brunt of this disruption disguised as a virus was borne by everyone. From a minuscule migrant labourer to corporate giants, no one was spared from having their work and life come to an unsolicited halt. Nevertheless, the pandemic changed a lot of things about the way humans work and contributed significantly to the list of things that have become the ‘new normal’. A prominent change however has been- the shift of education from conventional classroom teaching to internet-driven and technology-driven online teaching.

In the wake of the pandemic, when conventional teaching in the physical realm became impossible, there was a total paradigm shift towards online teaching. From kindergarten to higher education, every level of knowledge dissemination started taking place virtually. Due to the pandemic, the mode of virtual teaching became a very lucrative option for both- the teachers and the learners alike. Not only did it overcome the barrier of geography and help in stopping the community spread of the virus, but it also acted as a tool for enhancing learning and fostering growth among students.

This can be demonstrated by recent research, which showed that on average, students retain 25-60% more material when learning online, as compared to only 8-10% in a classroom[1]. This is mostly due to the students being able to learn faster online, than in a physical classroom. Not only that, but e-learning also requires 40-60% less time to learn, as compared to things taught in a traditional classroom setting because the students can learn at their own pace, go back and re-read or skip through concepts as they choose.[2] Moreover, complementary to these findings, another such survey demonstrated that when shifting from classroom learning to online platforms, academicians tend to make distinctions between the relative importance of content, pedagogy, methodology, and contexts, even though the curricula being taught is the same[3]. This being an easy source of learning, attracts a lot of learners and in turn, increases the time more children spend on the internet.

Online Teaching: A Giant Leap Forward?

Due to this increase in online teaching, children have wider and unchecked access to the internet, via phones, tablets, desktops, etc. They are left to explore the worldwide web unsupervised and have access to all sorts of information available- good and bad alike. The web can easily be used by a child to access an animated video, but with the same ease he can access non-age-appropriate content. As of today, around three million mobile internet users in urban India are aged below 18[4]. With this data only rising on an everyday basis, there is a pressing need to address the issue of digital literacy and online sexual grooming. To avoid the exploitation of children at the hands of cyberbullies, sexual predators, blackmailers, etc. More awareness about online sexual grooming, wherein a child knows how to respond upon being pressurised to do something sexual by a person online, should be imparted. Such encounters do not only destroy a child’s dignity and self-esteem but leave a child traumatised for years. Such trauma, in turn, naturally gives rise to issues like depression, anxiety, Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and may eventually lead to suicide.

In April 2020, the UN released a statement which addressed the issue that comes with this, it stated that ‘owing to the unprecedented lockdown and closing down of schools, millions of children are at increased risk of harm as their lives move increasingly online.’[5] It also warned about the increased risk that children face by spending more time in the digital space, as it makes them more susceptible to online sexual exploitation, at the hands of pedophiles and predators looking to exploit the COVID-19 pandemic. A lack of face-to-face contact with peers may lead to heightened risk-taking, while increased and unstructured time online may expose children to harmful things like cyberstalking, cyberbullying, etc.[6]

The Pandora Box: World Wide Web and Juvenile Minds

Before we talk about the safeguards present to protect children from harm online, we first need to understand who a child is. According to various laws[7], a child is any person under 18 years of age. Generally, a child becomes a major on attaining the age of 18, with the age of majority being different for different countries. However, in India, in case a minor has been assigned a guardian by the court, his age of majority becomes 21 years.[8] With the rapid growth in the usage of the internet, the High Court of Kerala acknowledged the prominence and the dependence that modern-day people have on the internet and thereby declared access to the internet as an integral part of Article 21[9]. The first step in the path of making cyberspace more secure would be acknowledging the fact that if put to good use, the internet can do wonders; But just like any other double-edged sword, it has its ill effects too. We may consider instant delivery of food, streaming movies, and paying bills at the tap of one button as boons and tool of easement, but these benefits are accompanied by grave ill effects that may even cost the life of the child who’s being subjected to things like cyberstalking, cyberbullying, etc. Giving a child unrestricted access to the internet is nothing short of opening the pandora’s box.

Upon encountering adult world problems on the internet, a child might get scarred for life. The occurrence of fiascos like the ‘Bois locker room’[10] incident, wherein chats of a group of teenage boys were leaked, in which they were found to be passing lewd comments about their female counterparts, and even going to the extent of giving them rape threats; is important to point towards the fact that in the current time of rapid digitalisation, lack of digital literacy leaves scope for children to get caught up in the dangers of cyber-stalking, cyber-bullying, online fraud, etc. Apart from this, types of abuse of sexual nature against children online can broadly be categorized into three heads that are: solicitation, providing access to sexually explicit content by minors, and exploitation of children for child pornography.[11]  Solicitation of a child would essentially refer to another person trying to allure the child into engaging in sexual acts on an online forum. With a rise in cases of online grooming, wherein pedophiles assume various identities and engage with children in order to pressurise them into doing something sexual; a child becomes more vulnerable to acts of solicitation and exploitation.

The Legislative Framework: How Sacrosanct?

The laws existing as of now, fail to actively address the topic of the safety of children on the internet, in particular. This can be owing to the lack of awareness among social institutions like schools, parents, and even law and policymakers. There is widespread consumption of child online pornography, abuse, and exploitation, but no grievance redressal mechanism for the same. Owing to the ubiquity of the internet, weak domestic laws further make the child vulnerable at the hands of perpetrators who hide behind foreign domains. However, it’s not that child rights are completely ignored. Various existing legislation and provisions form a broad and vague outline of all that a child should be safeguarded against. The most basic issue topic of ensuring rights of children is given in the Constitution itself.

The Constitution of India guarantees Fundamental Rights to all children in the country and empowers the State to make special provisions for children.[12] To ensure that these do materialise, the constitution further uses the Directive Principles of State Policy to guide the State in forming policies that safeguard children from abuse and ensures that children are given opportunities that foster their growth.

To further propagate the ideas about child rights enshrined in the constitution, The National Policy for Children, 1974 recognised and gave importance to implement child-centric policies in prominent national plans. Further, when the National Charter for Children was adopted in 2003, it worked as a complementary aide to the previous legislation and underlined the intent to enable provisions to ensure a happy and healthy childhood. In continuance, to these pre-existing mandates, The National Policy for Children (NPC), 2013[13], was established in 2007, as an auxiliary to the Commission for Protection of Child Rights Act, 2005, for the periodic review of laws, policies, and programs to ensure that they are in sync with the rights guaranteed[14]. With regard to a child’s education, in particular, the NPC recognises and reaffirms that the state shall undertake measures to:

Ensure physical safety of the child and provide a safe and secure learning environment.”[15].

Ensure that all processes of teaching and learning are child friendly.[16]

Provision for the access to Internet Communication Technology tools for equitable, inclusive, and affordable education for all children especially in remote, tribal and hard to reach areas[17]

Promote safe and enjoyable engagement of children’s experiences with new technology in accordance with their age and level of maturity, even as there is respect for their own culture and roots.[18]

These provisions point towards creating and enabling a safe environment for a child as he takes up learning in the digital space. Not only is this about safeguarding him from wrongs, but also about providing equal opportunities to all children for fostering their growth.

Apart from these policies, the government even framed laws to shelter children from harm. The Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, 2012 is one such act. It was promulgated for safeguarding children from being subjected to acts that are sexual in nature, like pornography, assault, etc; and provides for rigorous punishment to prevent the same. Along the lines of this, Section 67BofThe Information Technology Act, 2000addresses the issue of child pornography as well. It has provisions to punish acts for publishing or transmission of material depicting children in explicitly obscene sexual acts, etc., in the electronic form. Even though two separate legislations are addressing the same broader issue, the intricacy of it is not addressed properly by either of the two. The consensus on the mere definition of being found in possession of ‘child pornography’ is lacking. Section 67B, of the IT Act, states that whoever ‘collects, seeks, browses, downloads’ child pornography is an offender, whereas the POCSO Act, 2012 provides for only those who store such material for commercial usage. Both the legislations fail to address the issue of taking into consideration if the pornographic material such found in possession is for inadvertently viewing it and actively downloading it, or just an accidental mistake. Whether the act is done accidentally or knowingly is left at the court’s discretion. However, all this just points towards the issue that there is an urgent need to come up with revised, and more specific legislation that covers such loopholes.

Apart from these domestic laws, on an international front, the government of India has also ratified a lot of international treaties and conventions such as the United Nations (UN) Convention on the Rights of the Child, Convention on The Rights Of The Child, and its two Optional Protocols, etc.

Making sense of the Mayhem and What Lies Ahead?

The internet is so vast and so open, that staying protected at any point is a massive challenge, even for adults. Owing to the lack of a feature to distinguish between good and objectionable content, it can sort of feel like being in the mayhem. Regardless, online teaching does provide a lot of benefits to its learners; however, when comparing the pros and cons of this, the cons outweigh the pros. To ease out the ill- effects it has, policymakers, as well as the legislative, should actively work towards framing new laws, and covering the loopholes of the existing laws to make its implementation more effective, instead of being merely ornamental.

On an individual level, citizens should take up educating each other about the ill-effects of improper usage of the internet.  Civil societies, schools, NGOs, and the government could start by promoting digital literacy and online sexual grooming. Engaging in both child- grooming as well as adult-to-child parent/teacher grooming to teach and advise children to not indulge in sexual behaviour that they wouldn’t do in real life, like the exchange of unsolicited intimate pictures, sexting with strangers, etc. Further, there should be strict child lock settings on websites that have explicit or obscene content, in order to make it inaccessible for children. A model of this can be seen in schools in the United States where site blockers exist on school computers to limit the student’s browsing experience to academic sources only. Such strict measures ensure that the content is very child friendly. Further, it even improves focus and concentration on the topic being looked up, by blocking out distractions. Exposing children to the web very early on and unsupervised should be discouraged and positive internet usage habits should be taught and promoted.

*This article was published on the online blog run by the Center for Child Rights, National University of Study and Research in Law, Ranchi.

[1] https://theprint.in/india/education/students-retain-more-in-online-classrooms-shows-data/412669/

[2] https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/351137

[3] https://ies.ed.gov/ncee/wwc/DistanceLearningStudy

[4] https://www.themobileindian.com/news/21-percent-kids-in-india-hooked-on-to-mobile-internet-study-6430

[5] https://www.unicef.org/press-releases/children-increased-risk-harm-online-during-global-covid-19-pandemic

[6] https://www.outlookindia.com/newsscroll/online-predators-put-millions-of-children-at-risk-during-covid19-pandemic-lockdown/1802784

[7] The Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection Of Children) Act, 2015; Indian Contract Act, 1872; Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act (2012);

[8] Indian Majority Act, 1875

[9] Faheema Shirin R.K. v State of Kerala & Ors WP(C). No.19716 OF 2019(L)

[10] https://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/Delhi/bois-locker-room-a-reflectionof-an-existing-mindset/article31638044.ece

[11] https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/law/elj/jilt/2009_1/mathew/mathew.pdf

[12]  The Constitution of India, 1950, Art. 15(3)

[13] https://wcd.nic.in/sites/default/files/npcenglish08072013_0.pdf

[14] https://www.loc.gov/law/help/child-protection-law/india.php

[15] National Policy for Children (NPC), 2013, Section 4.6 (viii)

[16] National Policy for Children (NPC), 2013, Section 4.6 (ix)

[17] National Policy for Children (NPC), 2013, Section 4.6 (xi)

[18] National Policy for Children (NPC), 2013, Section 4.6 (xii)

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"To be a lawyer in a lawless time was like being a clown among the humorless: which was to say, either completely redundant or absolutely essential."

Salman Rushdie

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The overlooked stakeholders*

2020 showed us how everything could go wrong, all at once. From a virus bringing the entire world to a standstill, to floods, cyclones, and two superpowers almost ready for a third world war. This year has shaken us all.

Still, however uncertain times may be, the show must go on. The brunt of this disruption disguised as a virus was borne by everyone. From migrant laborers to corporate giants, nobody was spared from having their work and life come to an unsolicited halt. Nevertheless, in the hierarchy of the most to least affected, we tend to overlook the biggest stakeholders-the students.

In the wake of the pandemic, when every function of human life shifted to the digital space, the education system suffered the most. Not only were most colleges ill-equipped with the infrastructure to upload course modules online, but it was also important to take into account several student’s availabilities and exposure to the internet, all of which was conveniently overlooked. In these tough times, our students have become unsung warriors being pushed into a mayhem, involuntarily, and it doesn’t seem like their plight will end anytime soon.

In a general setting, it would be safe to assume that the government would work for the well-being of its public and not against it. However, instead of being sensitive to the problems being faced by students, the centre is abusing its power and making a mockery out of its system. Students at all levels are being harassed. For the final year students, it started with the uncertainty looming over the holding of their end semester exams. The Centre’s insistence, based on new University Grants Commission (UGC) guidelines, that final year examinations in all universities and institutions ‘MIGHT’ take place amidst the COVID pandemic truly portrays the helpless state of affairs our students are dealing with. The month-long tussle between UGC and SC affected students the most as there was no consensus on whether it’ll happen or not. On account of it happening, students were to expose themselves to the virus by traveling to their respective colleges, from the safety of their homes, where they were forced to go back when the colleges had shut down in March, due to the lockdown. At the time of such an emergency, the supreme court is only delaying the hearings, putting students through a lot of mental anxiety and stress. Many states are still under lockdown and railway services are also not available. however, these seem like trivial matters to the centre, which concerns itself only with matters of utmost importance. The supreme court has the time to take up Suo moto cognizance of a contempt case against senior advocate Prashant Bhushan and Twitter India, but not the time to listen to a petition regarding the final year exams, which concerns students from around 818 universities. Its either a statement to let everybody know that the apex body does not care about its students, or, that its priorities only revolve around itself.

This issue, is just the tip of the iceberg. Not only the final year students, but the upcoming first year is also caught up in a similar whirlwind. The batch of 2020, which passed out of school this year has seen more hardships than any other batch. It was this batch which back in 2017 faced the board system, in 10th class,  for the first time after the CCE pattern in CBSE Board was scrapped, and now to act as the cherry on top, they were exposed to this pandemic. The uncertainties for this batch started much before the pandemic though. In February 2020, due to communal violence in North East Delhi, a lot of students of the CBSE board were not even able to attempt their board exams. Not only that but the papers which were expected to be held later were scrapped in May due to the virus. These students, after working hard the entire year, never even got the chance to prove their potential and braved the ramifications of whatever the system had in store for them. The ironic thing is, not being able to write the most important exam in an Indian school student’s life was not even the worst thing to have happened to them. What is considered far worse, is the untimely postponement of competitive exams. It’s like, almost reaching the finishing line but realizing it’s a mirage, and you still have miles to go. Engineering and medical exams which collectively have more than 10 lakh aspirants, have already been postponed twice. Law entrances like CLAT and AILET have been postponed 4 times. If this is not the true test of an aspirant’s dedication and patience, I don’t know what is. The exam schedule has suddenly turned into some sort of “Agni pariksha” that no student consented to, but is still being forced into. there is so much uncertainty in everything, yet students are expected to maintain their demeanour and continue studying like nothing is wrong. These truly are the test of the times. Some institutions and states even went ahead with holding exams amidst the pandemic. The biggest example of why that should not happen is the- Karnataka state SSLC exam. The students were assured that social distancing measures and proper precautions would be taken, but to no avail. Videos of the exam centres went viral and no concept of social distancing was observed. The biggest question which arises after looking at such examples is, that why are students being made to choose between their future and their health? In case a student gets affected due to exposure to other students in the exam hall, he poses the threat of acting as an agent and transmitting the virus to his entire family. In such a risky venture, students giving centre-based exams is not advisable. Nevertheless, we are not learning from our mistakes. As of today, COMEDK is scheduled for August 19. It’s the first of its kind nationwide centre-based exam. Hopefully, good sense shall prevail and maybe this time we’ll get to see proper safety measures in place. If so, is the case, it shall set a precedent for proper conduct of further exams and give a much-sought relief to JEE and NEET aspirants who are set to write their respective exams in the first two weeks of September.

* This article was published on the online blog of Indique Law Journal

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(dȯ-ˌken-dō-ˈdi-ski-ˌmu̇s)  by teaching, we learn

Seneca The Younger

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The strength of the Constitution lies entirely in the determination of each citizen to defend it. Only if every single citizen feels duty bound to do his share in this defense are the constitutional rights secure.

Albert Einstein