Visakhapatnam: It’s not only physical punishment but also verbal abuse hurled at school children that has put teachers in trouble under guidelines of the Right to Education Act, which deals with corporal punishment.

According to the AP State Commission for Protection of Child Rights, about 30-40 per cent of the complaints regarding corporal punishment reported every year are related to verbal abuse.

Corporal punishment, according to RTE Act, is not only caning the children but also subjecting them to mental harassment through insults, ridicule, humiliation and derogatory remarks, that are detrimental to the students’ academic and psychological well-being.

“We have filed 32 cases of corporal punishment from 2014, after assessing the complaints. We have found verbal abuse of children being taken seriously by parents and brought to our notice,” said the commission’s incharge chairman S. Balaraju.

The commission, during the recent week-long Child Rights Convention Week celebrations, said 175 cases related to child abuse and 115 to violation of RTE norms-corporal punishment and depriving students of their entitlements.

“We have resolved most of the cases through intervention of district administration or collector. With proper counselling, the schools and teachers have been warned against inflicting physical punishment or verbal mental harassment. We could take criminal action against the culprits, by invoking Juvenile Justice Act,” Mr Balaraju said.

Denying children entitlements provided under RTE Act, such as midday meal, books, quality education, and toilet facility has become a major concern.

Asked whether parents had misused the facility by falsely complaining of corporal punishment, he said, “So far, we have come across one false complaint. We file cases only after proper inquiry.”

Some teachers, not wanting to be named, said the government should ensure proper teacher-student ratio and provide proper infrastructure before rounding up the teachers against the RTE Act.