Stakeholders press for ensuring child rights since the womb

Kathmandu, July 13: Stakeholders have urged with the authorities concerned to ensure the rights of the children right from the womb up to eight years by incorporating it under Article 44 (3) of the preliminary draft of the new constitution. Clause 3 of Article 44 proposes that every child shall have the right to formative child development, and child participation. 
In a seminar jointly organized by a group of Constituent Assembly (CA) members for early child development, Seto Gurash National Child Development Service, Lalitpur and Save the Children today, the stakeholders made deliberations on the issues of child rights incorporated in the initial draft of the new constitution 
Although the Interim Constitution and national laws of Nepal incorporate many measures for the protection of children rights, the lawmakers pressed for the mention of "every child, from in womb to eight years, is entitled to conducive environment for the optimum physical, intellectual, social and emotional development" in the initial draft's Article 44 (3), dealing with the provisions related to the early development of children. 
Stating that for a prosperous society, the development of children was inevitable, Chairperson of the parliamentary Finance Committee, Prakash Jwala argued that it was vital for children, since in the womb to eight years too, have sound physical development. 
Similarly, former lawmaker Sita Poudel stated that for the development of the country, the government should increase its investment on the education of children. 
Speaking in a similar vein, lawmakers Jivan Pariyar, Ambika Khawas Rajbanshi and Gauri Oli among others stated that the family, society and state should pay attention for the early child development. 
Likewise, Agatha Thapa and Madhu Rajbhandari from the organizer sides, shed light on concept of early child development and its importance as well as good practices and investment for the same in their working paper presentation. 
One of the case studies included in the working paper states that factors like disdain, contempt, mistreatment, poverty and stresses could take huge toll on mental health of a child, resulting in problems in his learning, memory and emotions. RSS