Illustration: C R Sasikumar
As most of her colleagues and friends embraced social media in their 40s, Radha Shankar vowed to stay away from Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. But the 48-year-old teacher at a prominent Delhi school had a rude awakening a few months ago, when a Facebook profile with her name and photo cropped up. “My nephew looked into it and found an email address listed on the profile… It belonged to a student. This was the single-most harassing experience of my teaching career… there were two-three flirtatious chats with my friends,” she said.
She chose not to take strict action against the group of students who did this, and instead spoke to their parents and recommended counselling. Shankar’s is not an isolated case — several teachers and counsellors The Indian Express spoke to recounted instances of students using social media to harass teachers, run ‘slanderous campaigns’ or circulate hurtful memes.
“Students bullying teachers, teachers bullying teachers, teachers bullying students — all these dynamics exist in cyberspace now… Students think social media is untraceable and are unaware of the legal ramifications,” said Pavan Duggal, a Delhi-based advocate specialising in cyber law. The most recent case he dealt with was of a seven-year-old “hacking the school account” and sending abusive messages to the principal. Cyber security expert Rakshit Tandon recounted a similar case — a Class IX student had “hacked the email of the vice-principal and sent derogatory messages to the principal”.
Reena Singh, 38, an English teacher at a Gurgaon-based school, spoke about how “some students made my Facebook account so I stay connected with them or my peers”. “It was a harmless gesture but I felt my privacy was violated… They didn’t seek my permission. I had to counsel them on online consent,” she said. Sukanya Sharma, a 16-year-old student, explained how some students click photos of teachers and write what they think is ‘funny’ text on them before posting it online.
Initiatives by schools
In the face of a growing problem, schools have taken the initiative to fix things. At Gurgaon’s Heritage School, a special morning assembly was dedicated to cyber bullying. “The theme was LGBTQ, to make the point that we stand with children who are different from the rest… Specially-abled children face a different form of cyber bullying and that, too, needs to be highlighted,” principal Kaye Jacobs said.
Several private schools occasionally hold sessions on cyber safety. “A few years ago, we held a brief lecture on cyber space but only eight out of 800 parents showed up. Now, I have to call them on the pretext of other things and sneak in a few minutes on cyber safety. Else, they get restless,” said Aditi Mishra, principal of Delhi Public School, Gurgaon.
Ashok Pandey, principal of Ahlcon Public School in east Delhi, elaborated: “From joint to nuclear to single-parent families, there has been a major shift. That has unfortunately resulted in compensatory parenting. Parents need to step up, intervene and realise that the internet is just a tool, not a companion.” Ameeta Mulla Wattal, principal of Springdales Pusa Road, said the school has installed a “bullying box”.
“It can be anonymous if the child wants. On days that there are more chits, we hold a discussion with students. Teachers have also been trained to look for signs of bullying. If a student is missing from school for more than two days, without a note from the parents, we immediately call them,” she said, adding that “internet facility is only given in the presence of teachers”.
On May 2, Manika Sharma, director of Shri Ram Schools in Delhi-NCR, sent a letter to all parents warning them about “inappropriate sites and shows on television channels — such as 13 Reasons Why which is aired on Netflix and has adult content”. “From May 1-5, the Vasant Vihar branch of the school observed ‘Cyber Safety Week’ with interactive sessions for children, where they even recorded a podcast, and sessions for parents with cyber safety expert Rakshit Tandon,” Sharma said.
Counsellors such as Tandon and Geetanjali Kumar said the solution lies in a comfortable parent-child relationship and a time-table. “I urge parents to give kids desktops; laptops make it easier to hide things. Also, kids need a time-table that dictates how many hours they can spend on the phone,” Tandon said.
