New Delhi: The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) on Wednesday issued a notice to the Kerala government after taking suo motu cognizance of an incident in which nine girls were suddenly reported missing from a shelter home at Manganam in Kottayam district.
This is the third such incident that has been reported from the same district in recent months, according to the NHRC.
The Commission has found out that there is an alleged lack of supervision and effective monitoring of residents at the shelter home, run by NGO Mahila Samakhya. It is also accredited under the State Social Justice Department and the child Welfare Committee. The human rights watchdog also suspects that the nine girls may have been victims of child sexual abuse or some other form of ill treatment, which had forced them to leave the shelter home.
When a number of girls were traced by the local police to one of their residences, they allegedly resisted and refused to return to the shelter home but did not reveal their reasons for doing do. The Kottayam East police have lodged a case in this connection. Preliminary investigations suggested that the girls may have escaped from the shelter home on 13 November midnight. The incident was discovered at about 5.30 am next morning when a supervisor at the shelter home reached their room to wake them up.
The Kottayam East police have recorded the statements of the shelter home staff and also collected CCTV footage to delve deeper into matter and check whether any child abuse has taken place at the shelter.
A notice has also been issued to the Director General of Police, Kerala and a report sought within two weeks regarding the status of the case registered in Kottayam district and whether any arrests have been made.
The NHRC will also send a special team to the district to probe the human trafficking angle considering that such incidents of missing children are being reported repeatedlt from the same regions of the state.
Read all the Latest News, Trending News, Cricket News, Bollywood News,
India News and Entertainment News here. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.