PUNE: With crime against children on the rise, the state education department is planning to tie up with local NGOs as well as Unicef to introduce a holistic programme on sex education , ‘good touch-bad touch’, as well as turning teachers into first respondents in case of behavioural changes among students.Education commissioner Vishal Solanki said that the department had already undertaken one meeting with prominent NGOs and the second will be held next month. The programme will roll out by next year across all state schools.“We have decided to take up this issue rigorously across state schools. We are aiming to roll out the programme by next year. We are talking to NGOs to understand how best we can train teachers and students through age-appropriate sex education. The teachers can easily detect changes in behaviour of students. Hence, they also need to be trained to understand and educate students on sex education,” Solanki said.Further, Solanki said that currently there are programsme, such as the Avirat online training session, for 42,000 secondary teachers through which a few topics related to sex education are taught. However, under the new ‘holistic’ programme, teachers will in turn become counsellors for students in state-run schools. They will also talk to primary school students about good touch-bad touch and how to stay safe along with self-defence classes.“There are five to six NGOs from across the state. We will plan a meeting with all stakeholders such as teachers, NGOs and Unicef. Reaching out to students is a major difficulty faced by the NGOs as we have lakhs of students. Hence, we will train teachers as master trainers, who will then go onto to impart the information to other teachers. Making teachers more sensitive to this issue is the first step,” said Solanki. The project will be undertaken in a phase-wise manner.Sharmila Raje of the NGO Foundation for Child Protection said “We are trying to sensitize students as young as 5 years old about good touch-bad touch and how to stay safe. At the same time, we don’t want them to loose out on their childhood by telling them don’t talk to anyone and so on. Hence, teachers must be trained carefully and systematically.”Among older students, the topics covered should start from sexuality and then go on to how to stay safe, shared Raje. She said that rather than knee-jerk reactions whenever a crime is reported, a continuous movement to make children sensitive needs to be undertaken. “This will happen if we train teachers and they are given time throughout the year to provide age-appropriate education.”