The Jharkhand Police was once again caught napping after 35 children were abducted by the CPI (Maoists) in Gumla to be used as couriers who could be further used as human shield in case any encounter takes place with the security forces. The police, feigning ignorance, said that the problem could be tackled at the initial level directing the schools to raise an alarm in case absentees are spotted in the classes.
Gumla SP Bhimsen Tuti claimed that although no such report has been registered by their parents so far, but adequate action has been taken in this regard to ensure release of those children. “Officially no such report has come to our notice, but on the basis of Intelligence reports that such instances have taken place in the past, we have opened a police picket at Banalat to safeguard the children of the area,” said Tuti. “Now, it is the administrative responsibility to initiate developmental processes in the area to check push and pull factors responsible for mass migration from the area,” added Tuti.
The SP, however, put the onus on the schools to check such incidents. “Alarm must be raised by the local schools, keeping a tab over the dropout rates and start a search for each and every child who fails to appear in the school for some specific period of time,” he added. “Until and unless the noose around dropout rate is tightened, it is difficult to check such incidents in the future,” said Tuti.
Earlier in September 2013 also, the issue was highlighted after 11 children were forcefully taken away by the CPI (Maoists) to train them in planting bombs. later, all of them were freed by them after the death of a child was leaked in the media. The Maoists had abducted 11 children on September 2013 from Bandhua village under Herhanj police station in latehar after they failed to pay a fine of Rs 5,000 imposed by the rebels on each household of the village alleging them of cutting trees of the adjoining forest area for preparing filed for cultivation.
Referring to the problem of abduction of children by the Maoists in the area, Tuti suggested that the monitoring should be done at the school level keeping an eye on the dropout rates in the local schools and absence of each and every child from the school must be questioned by the district administration. The State Commission for Protection of Child Rights (SCPCR), on the other hand, will soon seek a report on the issue fixing the responsibility on the State Government.
“Police do not have any solution to this problem as all 45 lakh children in the State could not be provided security, but responsibility will have to be fixed for this incident as it is a carelessness of State government,” said SCPCR member Sanjay Mishra. According to police reports, the Maoist guerrillas were training children in Jharkhand to plant bombs after a 10-year-old boy Pardeshi lohra was killed during a training exercise in latehar. Police claimed that the whole episode got out of hands of the rebels as the child died during the training and they started damage control exercises and denying forceful induction of children in their cadres.