Almost 2,823 female students are reported to have fallen prey to sexual harassment during the past two and a half years due to the misuse of mobile phones by schoolchildren. Since students are given smart phones by their parents for their online studies, these students had engaged in love affairs with unknown persons. Eventually these students have become victims of sexual harassment and some of them eloped with their newly-found lovers endangering their lives and future, said Kurunegala District Senior Director of Education W.M. Balasooriya. He told a meeting of school heads of the Kurunegala district on Wednesday that about 56 female students had become pregnant as a result last year.
Balasooriya said that nearly 3,890 such case had been reported to the Police during the past two years and all school heads and parents need to be alert over their teenage students.
He said that parents should limit or curtail the use of smartphones by their children and many teenagers in the country have become addicted to phones and the students pay less attention to their studies as a result. About 16 students are reported to have committed suicide during the past two years as they had been taken to task by their parents and elders over the misuse of mobile phones and wasting valuable time. About 87 students had been taken in for questioning for planning and committing acts of heinous crime and robberies by using mobile phones during the past 18 months, he added.