With the rise in bullying, NGO takes up task to dismantle it at the roots
PUCHONG: Courage is fire and bullying is smoke, said the former British Prime Minister, Benjamin Disraeli.
With this in mind, two individuals formed the Anti Bully & Anti-Harassment Society Malaysia, in order to address the rampant bullying going on in Malaysia.
The NGO was founded by Dr Suresh Verasingam and Datuk Dr Rajaindoren serves as its adviser.
“I was initially doing charity work by feeding homeless people for the six years using my own resources.
“But for the last two years, I was hearing a rise in bullying cases, mainly taking place in schools.
“I was horrified to hear about a school student who hung himself due to bullying. So, I decided to start this organisation, which I call as voice of the people, said Suresh during an exclusive interview with The Leaders Online.
The NGO is aimed at addressing the root of bullying, which in Suresh’s view, starts at the school level itself. Therefore, most of his campaigs are run in schools.
“Whenever we hear a case of bullying, we will approach the school to offer our expertise.
“Of course, we can’t address the problem on our own. So, we get the police and the school principal to participate in our programme,” said Suresh.
In their usual process, Suresh said that when a case is reported, he would immediately hold a meeting involving the school principal, the bully and the victim.
One of the issues schools face, in his view, was the lack of counselling given by the school authorities to the victim and the perpetrator when bullying occurs.
“One case, for example, was when I personally counselled a 10-year old kid in Kedah. He was bullying his friends in schools.
“When I asked him where he learnt all this, he said it was from home. When I contacted his parents, I found out that the boy always raises his voice to his sister and his parents don’t reprimand him.
“ I then realised the root of the problem. He was using the same method to control and bully his friends. So I counselled him thoroughly and the last I heard, the boy has changed a lot,” said Suresh.
Another victim involved a foreign workers who was abused by his employer.
Suresh said that the Indian workers was abused and left unpaid by his employer. The victim somehow got in touch with the NGO and was rescued.
“The case is still ongoing but the victim is safely back in India with his family,” he said.
Coming back to bullying in schools, Suresh said that he sometimes gets the District Education Department involved when the case warrants it.
“I will get the bully and the victim to sit in the meeting with the officials, together with the parents’ and police. Sometimes, the police have to take action against the bully’s parents for their apathy.
“The idea is to instill fear within the bully’s heart,that his or her actions will not go unpunished,” he said.
Suresh also noted that a lot of schools have little idea on how to address bullying and there was no concrete campaign to raise awareness over the matter.
“So, my NGO took up the task and we go around giving speeches about bullying and its adverse effects.
“We also get police involvement in our campaigns, where we put up visuals on the side-effects of bullying so that students will not indulge in such things anymore,” he said.
On how the government can address bullying, Suresh said that it was vital for the authorities to come up with some form of punishment for the bully’s parents, citing the latter must take responsibility for the child’s misbehaviour.
He added that schools must also engage NGO to raise awareness on the negative impact of bullying, by having some talks or even drama play about it.
“We can also use social media to raise awareness. People must know bullying is bad and there will be consequences for those who are indulging in it,” he said.
By S Jeevita
