Thaindian News

New Delhi, May 19 (IANS) Street plays, songs and slogans will be some of the new methods the Delhi government will be adopting to prevent schoolgoing children of the national capital from taking to inhaling intoxicants like paint thinner and eraser fluid.

Delhi government has submitted its action plan before the Delhi High Court, which is to be followed in all schools under the Directorate of Education here.

The government in its plan submitted Wednesday has cited as to how training sessions will be conducted at all schools for teachers as well as for students.

Hearing the submissions, a division bench of Chief Justice Dipak Misra and Justice Sanjiv Khanna disposed of the matter and directed the government to implement the new policy at the earliest.

The bench also said: “Posters should be displayed at key points of the national capital, so that the children and their parents get to know about the harm caused by inhailing intoxicants.”

“In parent-teacher meetings the school authority should tell about this kind of intoxicants been used by their child in the school campus,” said the bench.

The bench was hearing the PIL filed by a lawyer, Sanjeev Sabharwal, who sought an order for restricted access of eraser fluid, naphthalene balls, pain-relieving balms, nail paint remover, paint thinner, among other such substances, to school-going children.

The PIL was based on a news report and sought the court to direct the government to take preventive steps in the availability of certain daily items which are being used by school-going children for addiction by way of inhaling.

In its proposed action plan, the government in its affidavit cited the methods like conducting plays or nukkad nataks, give children slogans to learn, make some stories highlighting the side effects of using these intoxicants and group discussions.

Sabharwal submitted before the bench that the government should ensure that such substances do not make way into schools and the parents must be made aware of widespread substance abuse among school children.

Costing just between Rs.15 and Rs.30, most children could buy these items from their lunch money. Some even go as far as inhaling petrol from their parents’ cars and parked bikes, said the lawyer.

According to the report, the doctors said prolonged abuse could damage brain cells and cause cancer.