UP Schools To Teach Girls Self-Defence: Can We Also Teach Boys Self-Control?

Over 4,500 state-run schools in Uttar Pradesh have planned a six-day special self-defence programme to train nearly two lakh girl students. This move has been initiated to ensure the safety and well-being of girls. The state government has planned to provide self-defence training to girls under the Rani Laxmibai self-defence training programme as a part of Mission Shakti, launched alongside the "School Chalo Abhiyan."

Girls will also be made aware of cyberbullying, acid attacks, etc. through various group discussions under this programme. Under this scheme, girls between the ages of 11 and 14 will be trained to be mentally balanced, which will empower them against any unexpected situations. The students will also be issued an evaluation certificate after the training.

UP Schools To Teach Girls Self-Defence

I’m really fascinated by martial arts, and I think that people should take them up for various reasons. As a mother, I would definitely encourage my daughter to train in martial arts. Also, it’s commendable that the government is beginning to take this initiative of imparting self-defence training.

That being said, how effective will a six-day workshop turn out to be? Why is it focused only on girls in a particular age group? Why aren’t boys of the same age group taught the same, considering that they too fall prey to paedophiles? According to the National Crime Bureau Records (NCRB) crimes against children was 33.6% in India. 33,348 cases of crimes were registered under the POCSO Act, involving 33,036 girls and 312 boys.

Yes, given the alarming number of crimes, teaching self-defence to girls is a great step, and I warmly welcome it. But what will this six-day programme for a specific group of girls accomplish? If we are being honest, it really is not going to help. If anything, it might trigger an interest in girls learning self-defence. But how many parents will be economically and socially ready to send their daughters to martial arts classes?

I had a few self-defence seminars when I was in school and college, which did make me feel empowered back then. But the truth is, unless self-defence moves are trained in our muscle memory with actual training and long-term practice, it is almost impossible to instinctively remember them when we are attacked.

When we are attacked, the first instinct for a lot of us might not be to fight. We would either freeze or try to escape the situation. This, however, doesn’t mean that self-defence training is useless. My point is that to be truly efficient, self-defence training should be made a mandatory part of the curriculum for girls to truly rely on these skills. No offence, but comparatively, self-defence might be more handy to the majority of us than trigonometry is.

Also, instead of solely focusing on "equipping" and "empowering" girls by teaching them self-defence, can boys be taught self-control? How long is society going to keep giving perpetrators a free pass by saying men will be men and women have to be careful? Why should we be asked to learn self-defence to save ourselves from being attacked? The very idea of asking us to learn self-defence to avoid being attacked is paving the way for the concept of victim-blaming. This again implies that women are responsible for the crime that happened to them. While teaching girls self-defence is great, what are we going to teach the boys? Can we focus on teaching boys "not to attack women?"

Self-defence programmes teach us how to deal with various situations, like when someone is trying to strangle us, pin us down, molest us, abduct us, etc. But many times, no matter how equipped we are, there is always the possibility of perpetrators overpowering us. Can we have sessions that teach boys the importance of consent, how to behave and respect others, how to get rid of the patriarchal mindset, how to stop bullying and harassing, etc.? Can we also work on preventing crime from happening in the first place?

Suggested Reading: Ludhiana And Uttar Pradesh Start Self-Defense Program For School Girls

Views expressed by the author are their own