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Introduction:
Children are the assets to every society. They are regarded as the future architect
of a nation. So responsibility of the society lies in nurturing them for their proper
growth. But the grim reality is that everyday millions of children around the world
are exposed to danger that hampers their growth and development
tremendously. Sometimes children are exposed to dirt, physical abuse,
exploitation and other situational hazards1. Bangladesh is a densely populated
country with populations about 160 million. About half of the populations of
Bangladesh are under the age of 18 who are considered as children and more
than 20 million of them are under the age of 5. The children have basic rights to

education, balanced diet, health and nutrition, protection, participation,

recreation, safe water, sanitation, and hygiene. Most of the children of Bangladesh
are deprived from these basic rights and abused sexually and physically. Among
child abuses sexual abuses are difficult to assess because of the sense of shame
they create and the risks children face in reporting them. In child beating
Bangladesh is in the top position in the world and physical punishment starts in
their homes. Children become victim of physical abuse during arrest and
interrogation, and children accused or convicted of crimes are often held with
adult prisoners from whom they are vulnerable to abuse. Street children and child
always falls victim of verbal, physical, and sexual abuse from police, gangster and
the general public. In Bangladesh, there exist different laws to protect the children
from abuse and to ensure their rights but in practice these remained failure.
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Types of child Abuse:
Physical Abuse Hitting, Pushing, biting, punching, choking, shaking, throwing,
poisoning, burning, scalding, Drowning.
Emotional Abuse Cursing swearing, attacks on self esteem, blaming criticizing
children feelings.
Sexual Abuse Forcing, involve physical contact for example, rape or oral sex,
non-penetrative acts such as masturbation, kissing, rubbing and touching outside
of clothing.
Neglect heartening, throwing, smashing, breaking thing, punching walls, hiding.

Hypothesis:
Do you know every year how many children get abuse physically &
psychologically?

Brief Literature:

We have looked into few reports which have been prepared in the past regarding
child abuse in Bangladesh.

One of the papers aims to improve our understanding about the prevalence and
determinants of child abuse in rural Bangladesh. Data from the 1995 sample
survey of 4643 children aged 1015 y in 150 villages were used. Findings revealed
that 21% of the children were in the labour force although the Bangladeshi laws
prohibited child labour. The prevalence of child abuse and exploitation was
widespread in Bangladeshi villages as 2.3% of all children were physically abused,
2% were financially exploited, 1.7% were forced to involve in inappropriate
activities, and 3% were forced to work for long hours. The prevalence of physical
assault was much higher among younger children although the probability of
other types of abuse was higher among older children. Boys were more exposed
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than girls to abuse of any kind. Poverty was also significantly associated with child
abuse. Multivariate analysis suggested that the out-of-school children and the
children of illiterate, landless and unskilled labourers were more likely to be
abused than others when age and sex of children were controlled. The paper
concludes that raising public awareness against child abuse and promoting
preventive measures should be adopted to reduce child abuse in Bangladesh.
Public Health(2000) 114, 380384

Why We Choose This Topic?

To measure the scenario of Child abuse in Bangladesh
To find out the causes of prevailing child abuse in Bangladeshi society
To find out how much street children are abused.
To reveal whether the child abuse violate Human Rights.

Methodology:
Explanatory survey method has been followed in this study. Both secondary data-
journal, books, newspaper and primary data has been used. A sample survey was
conducted for primary data collection from the field. The study covered entire
area of Baridhara and Bashundhara . The size of sample was 40.

Sample Survey:
A sample survey is a process for collecting data on a sample of observations
which are selected from the population of interest using a probability-
based sample design. In sample surveys, certain methods are often used to
improve the precision and control the costs of survey data collection.

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Randomly select people for sample survey to research. It covers a lot of people in
a short period of time. Gives us a quick solution.
Interview & Questionnaire:
Specific question with direct answer & questionnaire is a set of question where
classification of question not possible

Data analysis:
Primary data has been collected through conducting survey over the street
Children and People within Baridhara and Bashundhara area . Sample size is
20 and 62% were male child and 38% were female child aged from 4 to 15
years. Information have been collected using the semi- close ended structured
question.

Sample Frequency Percentage

Male child 13 65%
Female Child 7 35%
Total 20 100%

It has been found that most of these childrens parents are not alive but they
are abandoned or sometimes they were forced to flee from their house. Some
children came out for bread and butter. 80% childrens parents are alive while
20% childrens parents are no more. They have no schooling. Most of the
 children were neglected and they lead miserable life. Sometimes they collect
garbage, wastes, scarp paper, begging or sometimes vending. Thus they are
depriving of their human rights and fundamental rights.
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Besides, 73% children are physically tortured i.e. kicking, slapping, beating, pulling
with ear etc. Among them 43% were female child while 58% perpetrators are
passerby, family members and other adults, 25% are miscreants who beat them
physically, and 17% actors are law enforcement agencies.
Sometimes street children are illegally used for smuggling drug and they became a
safe transshipment for carrying drug and other illegal business. 30% children
acknowledged that they are addicted and used to smuggle drugs while smugglers

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use them as a transshipment. Besides a group of criminals use the small children
to beg for alms in commercial basis.

In Bangladesh, female children are more vulnerable to sexual abuse. In our survey,
we found that 33% children are sexually harassed. Among the children who
experienced sexual ill treatment 20 percent are girl child.

Street children are most neglected part of our society. It is the responsibility of the
govt. to provide them with their basic needs and ensure their security and rights.
But it does not completely happen in the case of these abused children. Only 40
percent children get assistance from the passerby, police or other people while
they are physically tortured or sexually maltreated.
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Assistance during abuse

Got support No Support

40% 57%

Govt. agencies, Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) are not stretching their

helping hand properly for this most abused section of the children in the society.
From our survey we found that only 37% children get NGOs beside of them while
63% get no response of sympathy from the NGOs or govt. agencies.

Most of these children get no proper shelter and medical care. Majority of these
children have to live under open sky. From our worksheet we found that 63%
children get no shelter and medical facilities.

Forced labor also cause physical and psychological damage to the children. 48%
children experienced forced labor and they were compelled to risky works and
sometimes to those works out of their bounds.
Being abused, 25% children sought justice to law enforcement agencies while 75%
found no resort to ask for judgment against physical and sexual ill treatment and
negligence.

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Findings:
From the above analysis we find,

Most of the parents, caregivers and teachers think that Cane is the Best
teacher and beating children is nothing serious. It becomes a fatal
problem generating from the socio-psychological construct of our mind.
The rate of physical abuse in rural Bangladesh is higher than that of the
urban area and most people are on the favor of corporal punishment.
 Majority percent of the children are abused by their close relatives and
caregivers and child killing and child abduction has been increased
alarmingly.

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Physical torture in the country especially domestic abuse in Dhaka city is on
the rise which is negatively impacting the life of these working children.
Sometimes they are forced to work out of their capability.
In case of sexual abuse, the ratio of female child is higher than the male
child but recently ratio of male child has increased. Half of the disabled
children are abused sexually.
Child abuse is the direct violation of Human Rights. Recent scenario of child
abuse in Bangladesh implies the violation of childrens rights and human
rights as well (Article-1, 2, 5, 26.1 of UDHR and Article-19, 24, 34, 35 of UN
CRC).
Absence of proper execution of law also instigate child abuse. Besides
absence of justice and social norms inspires the criminal to the crime. Flaws
of laws hamper the durability of punishment in the way of exemplary
judgment.
Majority percent of the street children in Dhaka University campus are
abused by the adults and passerby and they rarely get help from the law
enforcement agencies. Besides NGOs and Govt. agencies also stretches
their helping hand a little.
They hardly get medical facilities and most of these children, being abused,
do not sought justice or find no resort to seek.
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Recommendation
To reduce child abuse following recommendations can be followed:

Better assessment and monitoring system should be initiated. Governments

should monitor cases of child abuse and neglect and the harm they cause.
Such monitoring may consist of collecting case reports, conducting periodic
surveys or using other appropriate methods.

Governments should assist local agencies to implement effective protection

services for children i.e. alternative care placements for children.

Child Court should be launched immediately.

Awareness should be created among parents about the consequences of

risky child labour , and accelerate the food for education program at a large
scale.

NGOs should increase their area of activities and take special program to
prevent child abuse.
There are only three child rehabilitation center in Bangladesh. So more
rehabilitation center need to be established.

Capacity of the law enforcement agencies should be increased.

Toll free hotline system should be launched so that news of physical and
sexual abuse of children can be reached to the law enforcement agencies
with a short moment.

Affairs of children rights should be introduced in the National Curriculum.

 Public awareness should be raised against child abuse and the national and
social media should be more active.
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Social organizations should run social movements and anti- child abuse
campaign.
Political parties has strong network across the country and they should play
strong role against child abuse.

Conclusion:
At last we can conclude that psychological set up of the people and sometimes
traditional thinking causes child abuse. Poverty is the driving force behind the
child labor and trafficking of children directly violate the Universal Human
Rights. Laws are not fully implemented and flaws of rules and regulations are
primarily responsible for child abuse in Bangladesh. Most of the children are
abused by their close relatives and caregivers and child killing and child
abduction has been on the rise. Female child are the most vulnerable to sexual
violence but recently male children are also sexually harassed in their school,
madrasas and workplace. Street children and working children in launch
station, shopping mall etc. are raped every day. To remove this problem govt.
needs to initiated better monitoring system and NGOs need to increase their
area of activities and take special program to protect childrens rights. There is
no alternative to raise public awareness against child maltreatment. This
heinous practice cannot be removed only through applying laws, social protest
must be made. Besides political party can include this issue in their agenda and
play a strong role in eradicating this inhuman malpractice from the society.
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Bibliography:
Child abuse- Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_abuse

Child abuse among working children in rural Bangladesh: prevalence and

determinants:
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S003335060000367X