Safecity and Shethepeople are Hosting Roundtables at Child Sex Abuse and the Law on 29th September

Shethepeople TV and Safecity are hosting roundtables at Indira Gandhi Institute of Physical Education and Sports Sciences in Delhi on 29th September. The purpose of this roundtable talk is making the children aware of child sex abuse and how the country’s law is helpful to protect them from the perpetrators. Different colleges across cities will participate in the event aimed at raising awareness on sexual violence and related laws in India.

Child Sex Abuse is a growing concern and an urgent need to address this issue because in most of the cases children hide these experiences form parents and teachers due to many social constraints. This coupled with the lack of adequate sex education or dissemination of information to children about their bodies, their rights, and their autonomy makes the need for a strong law very important.

At roundtables on Child Sex Abuse and the Law, children will be educated about the difference between safe and unsafe touch, how abuse can affect them, how to protect themselves from abuse and whom to approach if something were to happen to them. By doing so, they would not help just themselves but also protect others from being harassed or abused.

Safecity and Shethepeople are hosting Legal Roundtables at different colleges across cities to help build conversations around Sexual Violence and related laws in India amongst youth towards solution driven conversations.

Shaili Chopra Founder Shethepeople TV says,” For us safety of women and their rights is a big part of the agenda. It is important for women to get exposed to the laws and rights that they must know of. As a objective she the people wants to be ahead of the curve in supporting them in that all tools that they can possibly need.”

ElsaMarie D’Silva Founder and CEO Safecity says, “The Legal Roundtables are a medium for us to educate students and educators on the spectrum of sexual violence and the various legislation that is available for recourse. Sexual violence is a global pandemic affecting one in three women around the world on an average. Most of these occur before the age of 16 and yet 80% of us choose not to report it officially thus making the issue "invisible". By creating these spaces to have a discussion on it and educating people on their rights we hope to be able to encourage women and girls to report sexual violence and men and boys to be more active bystanders and intervene to stop the violence.

ElsaMarie D’Silva further added, “Child sexual abuse prevention is everyone's responsibility. Understanding the law, the procedure for reporting and one's own responsibility if someone confides in us, is extremely important. We must create safe spaces for discussion; encourage reporting and finding help if we want a safe, healthy and inclusive society.”

Ritu Priya says: " We have really good laws in place what we need to focus on urgently is effective implementation and accountability. The legal round tables are an effective platform for the stakeholders to come together and discuss ways of keep moving forward.”