Kidnapping of children, especially girl child below 16 years, in Odisha is on the rise with the year 2016 seeing on an average over three girl children being kidnapped/abducted every day.
Enormity persisted in 2017 as the State police have registered kidnapping/abductions of over 500 girl children from January to July.
The perilous fact is whereabouts of nearly 800 children are still unknown to the law enforcement agencies in State. Interestingly, around 90 per cent of them are girl children. And, two-third of the children still untraced has been kidnapped since year 2012.
As per data available with State police, the year 2016 had recorded kidnapping or abductions of a whopping over 1,147 children.
Significantly, when in January – July 2017, the tally has crossed 500, comparably year 2014 and 2015 had recorded only around 300 and 450 such cases, respectively, during the corresponding period.
How the menace is growing at a diabolic pace could be ascertained from the fact that Odisha had registered a mere 96 child kidnapping cases in 2012, which now have risen by a breath-stopping 1,094 per cent to touch 1,147 in 2016. What looks graver is four in every 10 kidnappings were done to coerce the girl child for marriage.
An analysis of State police data reveals that police failed to arrest even half of the accused in kidnapping cases. And the charge-sheeting rate in kidnapping cases has been around 49 per cent only, though it is higher than around 32 per cent in 2013. Notably, the conviction rate then stood quite abysmally low at only around 0.3 per cent in 2016. Ironically, the conviction rate looks bettered from nil conviction rates in 2012.
Moreover, district wise data reveals that kidnapping cases mostly come from districts like Mayurbhanj, Sundergarh, Keonjhar, Baleswar, Bhadrak, Jajpur, Puri, Kandhmal, Kendrapara, Balangir and Ganjam, and socio-economic data shows that 75 per cent victims belong to poor Scheduled Castes/ Scheduled Tribes and OBCs. Police sources informed the observed trend of girls being lured outside State as domestic helps, and at times were even pushed into flesh-trade in north India.
While police sources blame no prompt registering of kidnapping cases for delay in arrests and conviction, child rights activists attribute the poor show to lackadaisical attitude of police stations in handling kidnapping cases. Not even one per cent of conviction rate clearly alludes to shoddy investigation, charged Ranjan Mohanty.
The argument holds some water as it is seen at times NHRC/OHRC have intervened in State and directed police to register cases.
A top police official, however, countered by citing a case in Sundergarh where the complainant later turned hostile as the affected parties sealed a patch-up, since the accused were known to the victim’s families.