Kailash Satyarthi calls for urgent need to have public, sex offenders’ registry

Satyarthi made the call on the sixth day of Bharat Yatra, a 35-day long march across the country, to build an awareness on combating child sexual abuse and trafficking.

Bharat Yatra was launched by Nobel Peace Laureate Kailash Satyarthi on September 11.

Speaking at the start of Bengaluru stretch of the Yatra, Satyarthi said: “India boasts of great scientific knowledge and talent. We should use our knowledge and expertise to build a robust public sex offenders registry. If a comprehensive skill registry can be built by us, then so can a public sex offenders registry, to make India safe for our children."

"I urge all software engineers, disruptors, innovators and scientists to join hands and come together in building this for our country” he added.

At the public rally in Bengaluru to generate awareness about the growing crimes of child sexual abuse and trafficking, Satyarthi also emphasised the importance of technological innovation and urged the people of Bengaluru to harness the power they possess and engineer a revolutionary social change using it.

“What better city than the Silicon Valley of India to lead this war? Across the world, Bangalore is acknowledged as a hub of IT and innovation. If innovators and entrepreneurs can deploy technology to change our day to day living, surely we can together come up with technology to protect our children? Our smart phones can help provide us with any information from across the world," the Nobel Peace Laureate said.

"They are supposed to be theft proof. Surely our young innovators and scientists can create new apps that will help us protect our children more effectively? Simple things can make a big difference” he added.

Ever since its launch, Bharat Yatra has been drawing enormous support from citizens across India, including Bollywood's legendary actor Amitabh Bachchan who tweeted to his fans to support the Yatra.

Earlier, Union Minister for Shipping and Finance Mr Pon Radhakrishnan had flagged off the Yatra from Kanyakumari along with Mr Satyarthi.

In Trivandrum, Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan assured the whole hearted support from his government in eradicating the menace of child sexual abuse and trafficking.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi had sent a personal letter to Kailash Satyarthi extending his support to the Yatra, which will cover 11000 kilometres across 22 States, including Karnataka. Some of the key cities it covers include Chennai, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Mumbai, Guwahati, Bhopal, Jaipur, Srinagar among others.

Satyarthi has been campaigning for the freedom, safety and security for children across the globe for the past 36 years. His Nobel Peace Prize (2014) was for his continuous efforts and struggle for the rights children.

The Yatra is the launch of the three-year campaign against child rape and child sexual abuse which is aimed at increasing awareness and reporting of the cases, strengthening instuitional response including medical health and compensations, ensuring protection for victims and witnesses during trials and increasing convictions of child sexual abuse in a time bound manner.

Kailash Satyarthi Children’s Foundation mission is to create, implement and advocate child-friendly policies that ensure the holistic development and empowerment of children.