A School Safety Programme is Using Ballads to Sensitise Students in Jammu & Kashmir

Syed Areej Safvi writes lines of poetry, sets them to music and performs in government schools. She is doing what many balladeers did hundreds of years before in the Kashmir Valley.

While the minstrels of old used this traditional musical genre of storytelling called Ladi Shah and sang songs loaded with humour, criticism and satire on social and political matters of the day, 28-year-old Safvi uses the story poems to raise awareness about mental health, school safety and disaster management amongst students.

About 24, 000 government schools in Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) have become a part of a programme where students are taught and made aware about school safety, disaster risk management, mental health and gender based violence. And, Safvi has decided to use the very effective Ladi Shah to put her point across.

A non-profit organisation, ELFA (Education and Livelihood for All) reached out to Safvi to help them raise awareness about these sensitive and crucial issues in schools. Srinagar-based ELFA International started in 2017 with an aim to have a 100 per cent literacy rate in the state.

“ELFA signed MOUs with more than 24,000 government schools and in the year 2020 it came up with the School Safety Programme for educating the students on safety,” Mehran Khan, founder of ELFA International, told Gaon Connection.

As part of that, Safvi was roped in and she decided to use Ladi Shah as her tool of choice.

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“I was always interested in the performing arts and when I learnt about Ladi Shah I thought it was a perfect way of adapting it to raise awareness on contemporary issues such as school safety and mental health,” Safvi told Gaon Connection, adding that she wrote a script each time of about five to ten lines on mental health and performed it.

Safvi has a Bachelors in Psychology from Srinagar Women’s College and a Masters in Clinical Psychology from (IGNOU) Indira Gandhi National Open University.

About 253 kilometres away from Srinagar, another school teacher in Channi Himat, Jammu, is using innovative ways to educate her students on the same issues of safety that Safvi is raising awareness about.

Kamaldeep Kour is a 45-year-old science teacher since 2012, at a Government Higher Secondary School, in Jammu, who teaches students of classes nine and 10. Since April 2023 she has been actively involved in informing her students about disaster management, gender based violence and mental health.

“The workshops we have been having hone the problem solving abilities of the students. Instead of pressing the panic button, they are being encouraged to think of how to combat a problem,” Kamaldeep told Gaon Connection.

She surprised her students one day, to test their readiness in tackling disasters. “I set fire to some dry leaves and waste papers in one corner of the playground, rushed into my class and told the children to save themselves as there was a fire in school! I was so happy the children went out in an orderly manner, and there was no sign of panic,” said the pleased teacher.

New Delhi-based non-profit, Sustainable Environment and Ecological Development Society (SEEDS), has recently onboarded 11 grassroots organisations to pivot its ‘climate resilience through innovation’ campaign. Called ‘Flip the Notion’, SEEDS showcased their work at an event in New Delhi. ELFA International is one of the 11 innovators chosen under the project.

Talking about its School Safety Programme in J&K, Dr Manu Gupta, co-founder of SEEDS said, “An increase in the number of fires in Jammu and Kashmir has been caused by various factors, including rapid population growth, unplanned urban development, and congested access routes.

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Negligence in using combustible materials and outdated wiring also contributes to the problem. Moreover, there is a lack of sufficient fire personnel, vehicles, and fire stations, making it difficult to control fires effectively.”

ELFA International, in collaboration with the Directorate of School Education, Kashmir, organised a training programme as part of its ‘Safe and Inclusive Schools Project’ at the Directorate of School Education. ​The primary goal of the programme was to create awareness about school safety and inclusion among teachers, enabling them to effectively implement it in their schools and train other teachers and students.

This was for the first time that School Safety Kits were given to 100 schools in J&K, and both the teachers as well as students were happy, department education really appreciated the programme, said Gupta.

“The training sessions were inclusive in nature, different techniques were used to ensure the inclusion, for example training sessions were conducted with both children with/without disabilities. Teachers and the heads of institutions were informed as to how to ensure that school structures are disabled friendly so as to mitigate the problems specific to persons with disabilities,” he added.

ELFA’s School Safety Programme is ongoing in about 20 districts and teachers have been given special training, said Mehran Khan. “This is to help them be their sensitive best when they talk about gender based violence and mental health. Students have also shown interest and have been participating in the workshops that we conduct,” the 37-year-old added.

According to him, there are 42 people in his ELFA team, all of whom are trained to work with children.

Muneer Ahmad, an English teacher from the Government Middle School in Prang village in Bandipora district is now a master trainer (he was trained by ELFA). The 40-year-old teacher trains other teachers on conducting school safety programmes dealing with road accidents, school safety, fire accidents and rescue operations. There are more than 300 schools where he has worked and trained others on this.

“We ensure to do mock drills and training sessions after our workshops so that our students get to experience it practically rather than just listening to theory,” Ahmed added.