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Corporal punishment of children refers to intentional application of physical pain or discomfort on a child as a method of changing behaviour or as a disciplining measure. Is corporal punishment of children a human rights issue? International child rights instruments acknowledge the need to discipline children but make it clear that in administering discipline, parents or school authorities are bound by the need to ensure a child's personal integrity. Governments are obliged to take appropriate legislative and other measures to ensure that discipline is administered in a manner consistent with the child's inherent human dignity and in conformity with the law. Children are protected from treatment which ignores the fact that children, by virtue of being human beings, are entitled to be treated with dignity and respect. Physical abuse of children refers to deliberate physical injury by a caretaker. In the context of corporal punishment, the caretaker's primary intention is not to hurt the child for its own sake, but to correct or discipline through pain. What makes corporal punishment abusive is not the intention of the caretaker but the consequent negative impact of the application, which is often not limited to physical pain but extends to psychological injury - humiliation, degradation. The most important reason for banning physical punishment of children is that all people have the right to protection of their physical integrity, and children are people too. The difficulties in drawing sharp lines between acceptable and unacceptable forms of corporal punishment require a total ban since even ostensibly mild forms of corporal punishment often become severely abusive. Media reports of child deaths and incapacitation arising out of corporal punishment especially by teachers in Uganda give credence to this opinion. Ugandan law Uganda adopted English common law that a parent and other persons in loco parentis can lawfully correct a child through moderate and reasonable physical force. Thus parents and teachers will only be prosecuted if the injury caused to the children is grave. Is the above law still appropriate? Child rights activists should bring the issue to court for declaration. World over, landmark judgements have quoted human rights principles and condemned corporal punishment in schools and within the family. Our courts should be guided by such progressive judgements to save children from abuse. A petition challenging the legality of corporal punishment in schools was brought by the Parents' Forum for Meaningful Education before the High Court of Delhi. The government quoted English common law that provides for a right to use "reasonable and moderate" corporal punishment. Nevertheless the court directed the state to ensure "that children are not subjected to corporal punishment in schools and that they receive education in an environment of freedom and dignity, free from fear". Referring to the common law rule the judge said: "The rule was delivered about one and a half centuries back. Since then thinking has undergone a sea of change. The United Nations Child Convention is a testimony of that change and the importance which is being attached to the child. Law cannot be static. It must move with the time." In 1996 Italy's Supreme Court declared that corporal punishment for educational purposes is unlawful: "There are two reasons for this: the first is the overriding importance, which the [Italian] legal system attributes to protecting the dignity of the individual. This includes "minors" who now hold rights." In 2000, the Supreme Court of Israel declared corporal punishment, however light, unlawful. The leading judge noted that although many parents' use of force is not disproportionate in nature, "It is humiliating and against dignity. As a method of education by parents ....is entirely impermissible even when the parents honestly believe that they are fulfilling their duty and right to educate their child. The child depends upon gentle touch. The use of punishment, which causes hurt and humiliation, does not contribute to the child's personality or education, but instead damages." Ugandan society must be reminded of the individual's constitutional right to protection from degrading punishment and that this right is absolute and cannot be derogated from. Uganda's Constitutional Court has declared corporal punishment against criminals as cruel, inhuman and degrading. Is there justification for a child who has infringed social rules to suffer degradation? Pro-corporal punishment groups may forward the positive side of the practice. But the Global Initiative to End all Corporal Punishment of Children says, "We do not look into the effects of physical discipline on women, or on animals. It is enough that it breaches fundamental rights. Finding some positive short or long-term effect of corporal punishment would not reduce the human rights imperative for banning it." Further information