Surakshit, a new mobile application created by a Hyderabad-based NGO 'Enfold', aims to educate you and your child about what is a 'good touch' and what is a 'bad touch'. Let us find out of it is doing enough in protecting children from sex abuse
The Surakshit app tells you how to identify when a person is touching you the wrong way
The Surakshit app tells you how to identify when a person is touching you the wrong way
My child is only three years old. She is sociable, talkative and warms up easily to strangers. It puts her at some risk and I am in a very tough situation. While I do not want to curb her spontaneity, ebullience, I am always on my guard, bristling almost every time someone I do not know well enough, or at all, comes close to her, playfully pulls her cheeks or even offers her a candy. Heck, I am also the kind of hawk-eyed mom who stands guard in a shoe shop when the salesman helps her try something on. I am paranoid. It is ugly. It is also a reflection of the world we have created for our children.
It is every parent's nightmare — a touch that ends innocence- a touch from a stranger, from someone the child trusts, or is scared of. I was thrilled to know that there is now an app that could help parents and children learn about a good touch and a bad one, inappropriate talk, gesture or social behaviour. And I decided to put it to test.
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Surakshit, created by a Hyderabad-based NGO 'Enfold', is the application that aims at sensitising both the parent and the child about abuse and personal safety. And talk about the issue that is pertinent to children, teens and even young adults. This is particularly important in our society that sees nothing wrong with a stranger petting a child.
Surakshit does a neat job of identifying body parts that 'should always be covered' and how to approach a 'safe adult' when you feel someone is touching these body parts – whether our own or someone else's. It also addresses the issue of 'shame' – it is not your fault, the problem is with these sexual predators who 'break the personal safety rules'. There are real stories of personal safety and guidelines for how to be safe while on the Internet. So far, so good. But by the time you have explored all the pages, and gone through the law about child safety, you will be left wondering whether this is more like a ready reckoner or an application. I'd say it is the former.
The user interface, diagrams and deft handling of some of the trickier bits on child safety are all neat. But the application does not go beyond that. For instance, it merely lists the child help line number but a harassed parent or an anxious child should be able to dial directly from the application. Or write to the NGO. It could also incorporate some sort of a panic button — a way to reach out to the safe adults that the literature helps identify. The legal section could also offer a way to post queries. Seek counsel. There could also be a way to engage school authorities, that have often been at the heart of some of the recent incidents of child sex abuse.
But there are no live links. And it is a huge let down. The only interactivity that the application offers is the swipe. Without any active engagement, this is a strictly one-time experience. You download it, swipe it and then could forget about it. Pity because it could be so much more. Should you download Surakshit? Definitely. It will help you find the right lexicon to talk to your child about personal safety. It empowers you and your child with information that is vital in identifying and exposing perverts and predators. And there is no harm in carrying a ready reckoner around, is there?
The applictaion is available on Android and iOS
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