In a shocking incident, a minor girl of the district died in the SCB Medical College and Hospital, Cuttack, after giving birth to a baby by caesarean section and developing post delivery complications, including iron and hemoglobin deficiency.
The 15-year-old girl was staying in a distress home and had been admitted at the Baleswar district headquarters hospital when she developed labour pain. There she was operated but as her condition deteriorated she was shifted to the SCB.
The point of worry was that the unwed girl’s funeral was done at Cuttack as there was none to claim the body. Most pathetic is the world shut its eyes on the diseased without anybody taking any interest to lodge an FIR with police to know who impregnated her.
The girl of Jambani under Nilgiri lock had encountered ordeals after her father died and mother became mad. On Friday she delivered a male child at Baleswar but had to be shifted for further treatment given her critical condition. She died on Saturday.
Although she was about four months in a distress home in Sahadevkhunta after being rescued, yet neither any agency nor individual took care of her. The agencies that rescued or allowed her to stay at different points of time included the Childline, the CWC, Bapuji Sewa Sadan, distress home, where she was lodged and the district child protection officer.
“Any one of these agencies should have lodged an FIR with police to ascertain who committed the offence against the minor. But everybody is passing the buck,” lamented a social activist. The girl was rescued by a Childline unit of Nilgiri about four months ago. She was lodged in Bapuji Sewa Sadan. By that time the girl was six months’ pregnant.
But Bapuji Sewa Sadan head Namita Das said, “After her rescue we offered counseling to her. Yet, she never divulged who the culprit behind her pregnancy was.”
“No one ever informed us that the girl was victim of sexual assault and was pregnant during rescue. The distress home only informed that a girl was rescued,” said Sahadevkhunta police station IIC Paresh Rout. Child Protection Officer Itishree Mohapatra couldn’t be contacted.
Meanwhile, Baleswar Collector Sanatan Mallick said an inquiry would be conducted on the matter. “I have directed the CWC to find out the culprit through police,” he asserted.