Radio Netherlands Worldwide

You cannot have a hard and fast rule to bring up kids. Not all kids are the same, and not all react similarly. As a parent, you have to treat every child as per his inherent nature. My father rarely used a stick to discipline us, his scary frown was enough to terrorise us. However, he never shied away from slapping us, if he needed to punish us. However, I never used stick to discipline my kids, my booming voice was enough! However, there are kids, who understand only the language of a stick. In my view, it is better to be slapped by your parent in private in formative years than being slapped by strangers or police, in later years. The other day, as we treated rural kids in our mobile van, we discovered to our horror that one of the school kids-an eight year girl, had opened the purse of my colleague and taken out Rs 100! She was unrepentant on being caught! Her teachers were summoned, who were very sorry for her behaviour. They told that the girl was beaten severely by her father some days back, as she had stolen his money. Instead of getting a lesson, she had pick-pocketed an auto driver, a day before! We did recommend exemplery punishment and counselling for her, so that she grew up to be an honest citizen and not a criminal who would spend her life behind bars!