Mother and child

Mahmuda, 33 is a housewife who lives in Ratnapalong union in Cox’s Bazar district of Bangladesh. Ratnapalong union is a neglected and underprivileged area where people are not aware about child protection, child rights and positive parenting. Due to the lack of awareness of parents, children are consistently neglected and abused by their parents. Sometimes children drop out from educational institutions.

In this kind of society, Mahmuda is living with her 3 children (2 daughter and 1 son) and husband. Her husband is a day laborer. She used to hit her children for any small matter due to not realizing the importance of good care of children. That is why her children never shared anything with her.

As a part of positive parenting non-government organization named ‘BITA’ (Bangladesh Institute of Theatre Arts) with the support of Plan International Bangladesh has taken different initiatives to empower community people under the JP-CPiE project.

At the very beginning of this project, BITA formed parents and caregivers’ groups in the areas. Mahmuda is a member of the parents and caregivers’ groups. BITA staff are conducting various sessions and training for the group members as part of awareness-raising sessions. Mahmuda always participates in the session and training. BITA provided ‘Positive Parenting’ training sessions for the parents and caregivers groups. Different child protection related topics like childcare, such as child rights, child development, Negative effect of corporal punishment, active listening, parenting skills, anger management, etc., are in build in the training sessions.

In each session, she was present and able to learn about the discussion. As a result of this participation, she can understand how to keep the child safe and be aware of the behaviors that may hamper a child’s development, such as engaging in any abusive practices with the child. After that, she realized she needs to develop a personal awareness to understand that she must take a stand against these practices and raise awareness among other parents in the community about these issues. Then, she refrains from physically punishing her children, avoids scolding, and values the child’s desires and opinions. While she used to discipline the child verbally in the past, she no longer does that now. She believes that if other mothers adopt changes like her, then the children will be protective. So, she discusses child safety messages with her neighbors to raise awareness about the risks children face in the community. Many times, they engage in more detailed discussions about the topics when sitting down to tell stories. Not only that, even when several women come together to embroider Nakshi Kantha (a locally made blanket), then too she engages in more open discussions with the women of the village. Like her, they also do not involve children in risky work. Now they are very much aware about the education of the girl child.

According to her capabilities, she tries to raise the awareness among the children and other women in her communities. Sometimes, few are not interested in agreeing with her, but she always tries to cool down and tries to explain with her logic and rational way.