India urgently needs to embrace sex education for its young adults

Indian parents must grapple with multiple dilemmas when dealing with teenage children and young adults. One pertinent issue in this context is sex education.

Most Indian parents find themselves ill-equipped or unprepared to talk about sex education with their children. Sex is still a taboo subject in most Indian households and parents feel awkward, to say the least, talking about it with their youngsters.

The same can be said about the teachers of these young adults, who feel equally out of place when given the responsibility of sex education in schools and colleges.

So where do the youngsters of one of the most populous countries go looking for information?

Today’s Gen Z, as the youngsters are referred to, are exposed to a tremendous amount of information constantly through social media, peers or the Internet.

Most young adults who have access to the Internet resort to it to answer their queries about sex. The problem with this situation is that the information they might be getting may not be accurate or from reliable sources. This can result in a lack of proper knowledge about safe sex practices or, worse, misguided sexual practices.

For the illiterate and poor young adults, the situation is much worse as they do not have proper resources guiding them in their journey of puberty and adulthood. Consequently, there can be a rise in teenage pregnancies and sex-related crimes. 

According to government estimates, 6.8 per cent of Indian women aged 15-19 began childbearing between 2019 and 2021. Adolescent pregnancies are more common in rural locations and in economically poor states. According to the 5th National Family and Health Survey, 10.6 per cent of rural women aged 15-19 in Maharashtra began childbearing, which is higher than the national average of 7.6 per cent.

Adolescent pregnancy rates in Tripura and West Bengal, where socioeconomic challenges prevail, were 22 per cent and 16 per cent, respectively.

The National Crime Records Bureau report of 2022 highlighted a significant increase in reported crimes against women, which jumped from about 371,000 incidents in 2020 to about 445,000 in 2022. These statistics are reported figures and are much lower than the actual sex-related incidents in the country, since most go unreported.

The recent gruesome rape and murder of a female doctor in Kolkata highlights what our country is grappling with. When females are not safe in their workplace or simply walking back home, how can we neglect the concept of sex education in India anymore? How can we refuse to acknowledge the responsibility of talking to our teenagers about their sexuality? How long can we, the citizens, keep quiet about the sex-related crimes happening around us? It is high time that sex education be brought to the forefront and made a priority.

Sex education provides young adults with scientific information about a variety of topics on sex and sexual health. It also delves into the social and psychological aspects of sexual behaviour.

Sex education empowers young adults to make choices that protect their health, respect the choices of others and make socially acceptable decisions. It also helps to understand the emotional and physical changes that happen to them at the onset of puberty. The long-term impact of providing sex education to youngsters is tremendous, as it leads to overall health improvement in the country.

India has a few ongoing programmes to promote sexual health. The National Health Mission manages the RMNCH+A programme (Reproductive, Maternal, Newborn, Child and Adolescent Health), which delivers sexuality education outside of school through adolescent-friendly health clinics (AFHC). Through these programmes, adolescents receive information on contraception and prevention of sexually transmitted infections / human immunodeficiency virus infection. They also receive counselling on sex, gender, delaying marriage and pregnancy.

Another initiative is the National Adolescent Health Mission launched in 2014 (Rashtriya Kishor Swasthya Karyakram), which aims to address five priority areas: Improving nutrition, sexual and reproductive health, mental health, preventing injuries and violence as well as preventing substance misuse, with the help of peer educators attached to AFHCs. 

What we need is comprehensive sexuality education (CSE), which has been advocated by both the World Health Organization and UNESCO as the need of the hour for the world.

CSE will prepare young adults to lead productive, healthy and meaningful lives, and contribute to the growth and development of their respective countries.

Yet, many states of India have refused or banned sex education in schools, deeming it immoral and against the fabric of our culture. It is time that we revisited such notions and tried addressing the issue that millions of young adults in our country face.

On the other side, one of the few success stories is the UNESCO effort known as 'Udaan'. This is an adolescent awareness programme regarding sex education that began in Jharkhand in 2009. According to UNESCO's 2021 report, the initiative helped educate more than a million school children on adolescent health, including sex education, over a 10-year period (2009-2019). 

Most importantly, sex education should begin at home. The parents should also be made aware of the need to impart sex education to their children, and if required, they should be trained first on this important subject. Only if our society gets over this taboo of talking about sex can we encourage our young adults to be responsible about their sexuality.

A comprehensive approach that includes government commitment, educational integration, legal literacy, teacher training, resource utilisation, community engagement and constant evaluation is required for the future of sexual education in India.

By tackling these issues collectively, India can work toward raising a generation that is well-informed, polite and respectful to members of the opposite gender (as well as to members of their gender) and capable of developing healthy sexual relationships.

Shweta Jaiswal and DVR Seshadri are associated with the Indian School of Business. Views expressed are the authors’ own and don’t necessarily reflect those of Down To Earth.