Children of Jharkhand rescued from other parts of India do not seem to be living in a condition better than the condition which had led to their unsolicited migration to an unfriendly destination.
An exploited lot which was rescued from Bangalore has reached the same point from where their future would appear as dark as ever.
As many as nine children were rescued from Bangalore by the district administration and were brought back to the State on May 7. However, the ordeal for the nine children was far from over suggests a fact finding mission of child rights NGO, Children for Right to Education in Jharkhand (CREJ).
“The children were straightaway handed over to their parents upon their arrival. They were not put up at shelter homes and no counseling was arranged for them to make them get rid of their harrowing experiences at Bangalore,” said Sushanto Chakraverty of CRY Kolkata.
The fact finding mission of the child rights group exposed chinks in the policies of rehabilitation of rescued children and also lack of monitoring by the State agencies of the conditions of rescued children. The child rights group also found that the Child Welfare Committee of Koderma was defunct and the district education department did not verify presence of the children in schools where they were enrolled.
“It was surprising to know that the rescued children were not going to school either before they were trafficked or after they were brought back from Bangalore. But the school register showed that they attended school,” said Indramani Sahu of CREJ Koderma. Officials of Social Welfare, Women and Child Development were unavailable for their comments on the matter.