Maneka Gandhi for women non-teaching staff in schools

We have asked the HRD ministry .... that drivers, conductors and nonteaching staff in a school should be women MANEKA GANDHI

NEW DELHI: Union minister Maneka Gandhi on Sunday suggested that drivers, conductors and non-teaching staff in schools should be women in order to prevent child sexual abuse.

The Women and Child Development (WCD) Minister said that her department has also approached the human resource development ministry in this regard.

Her statement comes in the backdrop of incidents of alleged sexual assaults on two minor students on the their school premises and murder of one of them.

"We have asked the HRD ministry, and it is in the Women's Policy (draft) too, that drivers, conductors and non-

teaching staff in a school should be women," the Women and Child Development (WCD) Minister said over phone.

The National Women's Policy (Draft) was approved by a group of ministers, headed by External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj, in July and is pending before the Cabinet.

A seven year-old-student of Ryan International School, Gurgaon, was murdered allegedly by a school bus conductor for resisting an alleged sexual assault on Friday.

On Saturday, a five-yearold girl was raped allegedly by a peon in a private school in Shahdara.

A senior official in the WCD ministry said contractual staff at schools is an area of concern and they will be raising the issue with the HRD ministry.

The bus conductor at the Ryan International School was employed by a security agency whose services the school was taking on contractual basis.

The school has now cancelled the tie-up.