Gurgaon: Days after Substance Abuse and Narcotics Knowledge, Awareness and Liberation Programme (Sankalp) society was set up as the state nodal body for de-addiction and rehabilitation, it has now been announced that all schools will have to conduct annual self-audits to check whether their environment is designed to keep students away from drugs.Former Haryana DGP OP Singh, appointed chief executive officer of the society, said the focus would be on addressing the environment that exposes children to drugs rather than treating students who use substances as offenders. “A school audit will check the adults and the surroundings, not the children,” Singh said, explaining that the school education department would assess the availability of trained counsellors, whether students were taught refusal skills throughout the year and whether falling attendance indicated a need for intervention.Institutions in higher-risk areas will face joint inspections every term to identify gaps in counselling, assess drug availability around campuses and strengthen prevention efforts. Sankalp will use State Narcotics Risk Index to identify vulnerable neighbourhoods and prioritise support for schools in those areas, but will not publish lists of drug-affected institutions. “Those schools will receive support first, not surveillance,” Singh said.Outside school gates, Food and Drugs Administration and police would focus on the sale and availability of substances in places frequented by students. The monitoring mechanism will not involve maintaining registers of children suspected of drug use. Schools will instead record awareness sessions and anonymised counselling referrals, with students’ identities kept confidential. Singh said children needing help would first be referred to a school counsellor, who will speak to them and their parents privately before connecting them with health department clinics, the Tele-MANAS helpline (14416) or a de-addiction centre if medically advised.The approach, he said, would distinguish between a young person needing treatment and those supplying drugs to children. “The child who is using substances is someone we treat. The person who sells to that child is the one we prosecute,” Singh said, adding that police intervention would be required in cases involving drug supply, adults using children to transport substances or situations in which a child was in danger.The initiative will also intensify monitoring within the 100-metre zone around school campuses, where tobacco sales are already prohibited. Food and Drugs Administration will inspect chemists in these zones, while police will monitor shops, parks and bus stops.Singh said officials found protecting drug sellers would be treated as traffickers, stressing that public trust and visible enforcement would be essential to tackling the problem. Sankalp also plans to create a statewide network of head boys and head girls, with a confidential channel for reporting drug availability around schools.Alongside enforcement, the society plans to revive the SPAT-linked scholarship programme, which Singh said he had run as sports director. The programme required children to attend playground activities 22 days a month and stay away from drugs, and more than one million children had signed up. Sankalp also plans to involve Spicmacay to bring music into schools and use theatre to help students practise refusing drugs. “Lectures tell children what to avoid. Sport, music and theatre give them something to become,” Singh said.
