The Rotary Club of Ulhasnagar, RID 3142, conducted Sparsh Ek Ehsaas (touch and awareness), a personal safety awareness programme for 495 students from Classes 1 to 5, using age-appropriate illustrations, demonstrations and interactive activities to open a difficult conversation with young children.
Three certified trainers from the Inner Wheel Club of Ulhasnagar — Rachna Dalal, Latha Ranka and Dimple Shah — led the sessions. Instead of relying on a conventional lecture, the trainers used illustrated situations to help children recognise uncomfortable or unsafe interactions and decide what they could do.
For Classes 1 and 2, “the demonstrations dealt with situations such as being asked to play an unwanted game or being invited to keep an unsafe secret. The children were encouraged to understand that they could refuse, move away and seek help,” says Ruta Kolvekar, the club president. The teaching material also stressed that private body parts are private and that children should speak to a helpful adult when something makes them uncomfortable.
For Classes 3 to 5, the discussions went a step further, covering body boundaries, private body parts, personal safety and speaking up. One of the sessions distilled the lessons into eight simple rules: understand what is private, recognise safe and unsafe situations, say no, get away, “tell a trusted adult, keep telling until help comes — and remember that it is not the child’s fault,” says Ruta.
The trainers used illustrated situations to help children recognise uncomfortable or unsafe interactions and decide what to do.
She is happy that “the programme appears to have struck a chord with the school as the administration has requested that the awareness session be conducted twice a year. We are planning a follow-up session later this year.”
PDG Chandrashekhar Kolvekar, the club president’s spouse and a club member who has been associated with the initiative, underlined the importance of taking the conversation beyond the classroom. “The number of child-abuse cases has increased over the years. Children have to be made aware of the dangers of trusting people at home and outside, in their innocence. We have to give them the dos and don’ts so they are at least aware and can take action for their safety,” he says.
The collaboration between Rotary and Inner Wheel, says Ruta, “also gives Sparsh Ek Ehsaas a potentially sustainable model: trained volunteers equipped with age-specific material can take a sensitive but essential conversation into schools, giving children both the language to recognise unsafe situations and the confidence to seek help.”
The project was managed by Ruta, club secretary Muskan Shahdadpuri and project coordinator Ankush Kamlakant.