Tamil Nadu - Chennai

Children's rights declaration

Staff Reporter

CHENNAI: `Every child has every right' is the motto of the declaration drawn up by children from Tamil Nadu and Puducherry, who gathered recently under the umbrella of the alliance of non-governmental organisations for Children's Rights in a Globalising World or the CR4WSF.

The child representatives urged authorities to ensure that all children of school-going age are in schools with adequate infrastructure and urged compliance with the United Nations Convention on Rights of Children.

Providing and maintaining child participation in syllabus formation, legislation and budget allocation affecting children, and parent-teachers associations, freedom to choose a career, equal rights for boys and girls, an equal sex ratio, an absence of discrimination on the basis of caste and creed, a healthy social environment, buildings that are disabled-friendly and the availability of healthy and nutritious food are some of the rights listed.

Legislation should allow men and women to marry only at an appropriate age and should be changed to recognise all individuals below the age of 18 as children, says the declaration.

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