Concerns of Childhood in India

Abstract

This article points out some concerns that pertain to facilitating the development of children in context and the geopolitical issues that surround children as the State, community and parental agencies strive to care and rear children. State schemes like the Integrated Child Development Services and the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan suffer from the ills of managing country-wide programmes – poor infrastructure support facilities and personnel, lack of adequate monitoring mechanisms, inability to connect to the local realities including beliefs and aspirations of the people and the inability to get the various government departments together to move in tandem; not to forget the rampant corruption in the systems. Rays of hope are the NGOs, some of them at the national level that have made some inroads in the sectors of child protection, health and education. There is the rural/urban divide in the sectors of health, nutrition and education where private entry does not necessarily mean that they are child and parent friendly, they could be inadequate, exploitative and hostile to children and parents, without the knowledge of the latter. This is especially so of the private education sector. With the onslaught of the media, parents struggle to socialise the children as best as they can.