In all, 57 missing children have been rescued over the past 13 days in course of the Operation Smile State police re-launched in four districts for one month since June 1. The four districts are Haridwar, Dehradun, Udham Singh Nagar and Nainital.
In order to search and rescue missing children and hand them over to their families or to rehabilitate them at rehabilitation centres till the identities of such children are established, State police re-launched one-month-long Operation Smile in four districts of the State. The verification of missing children reported in various police stations in above districts was done from May 21 to May 31.
State DGP MA Ganapathy said that 345 children were reported to be missing in various police stations of the State since 2000 before this operation was re-launched on June 1. 39 children were rescued through physical verification. Out of 57 rescued children, missing report of 14 children has been registered in 12 police stations of Uttarakhand while two in the police stations of Delhi.
In 43 cases, no missing report of children was reported in any of the police stations. Out of 57, 43 children were handed over to their family members while 14 were rehabilitated in juvenile correction centre.
Out of 57 rescued children, 28 belong to other states. Currently, the number of missing children in the state is 295 since 2000. The police officers have been directed to take measures for handing over the children to their family members from Juvenile correction centres after the verification is done, DGP added.
He said that at the district level, one nodal officer of the rank of deputy SP has been appointed under the Operation Smile. Five search teams have been formed. Each team comprises one sub-inspector and four constables. A team of legal expert and technical expert has been formed too and they are assisting the teams for achieving the goal. At police headquarters level, additional SP Mamta Vohra has been made the nodal officer.
The drive was launched at places like shelter home, dhaba, factories, bus stations, railway stations and others where the chance of recovery of missing children was optimum and 57 missing children were rescued.
The team members have already been directed to seek help from various departments like social welfare, woman and child development, medical and health welfare, planning and labour. Besides, NGOs, child help line and child protection cells would be roped in.
Another police officer said that before the Operation Smile was launched in the state in 2015, the number of registered missing children was 774. As many as 762 children were rescued under Operation Smile in the State. A total of 670 missing children were handed over to the families. Ninety two children were provided shelter at juvenile correction centres. While 585 male children were recovered the number of female was 177. As many as 314 children were recovered from other States.