The Ministry of Women and Child Development (WCD) has asked the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) to strict visa rules so that people with criminal record of child abuse or habitual sex offenders do not enter the country. A proposal to this effect is being sent to the External Affairs Ministry. The visa rules in India do not make declaration of criminal record mandatory.
This is not the first time that the WCD Ministry has asked MEA to restrict entry of people with criminal record of child abuse of sex offenders in the country. There are many cases of travelling offenders who relocate to another place simply to have access to victims they can abuse.
Sources said that the WCD ministry is working on a proposal, requesting MEA to restrict visa rules for people having criminal records. "Tourists who travel to other countries with the objective of abusing kids can be curtailed at the entry points. There are many countries have strict visa regulations that prevent anyone with a history of sexual offense from entering their territories," said officials of WCD ministry on the condition of anonymity.
last year, a 54-year-old British man, identified as Murray Dennis Ward, was arrested for allegedly sexually assaulting three children at a home run by the National Association for the Blind, a non-profit organisation in the Capital. Ward was earlier booked in a "child abuse" case in the UK but was acquitted there for lack of evidence.
In another case, the Hyderabad police had arrested an American national for downloading and uploading child sexual abuse materials (CSAM) in January, 2017. In September, the Hyderabad police have arrested Omani and Qatar nationals in connection with human trafficking. Similarly, Beatris Sanday, 26, a Tanzanian national arrested in Himachal Pradesh for running sex racket last year.
As per Delhi police data, in 2011, British social worker Jonathan Robinson, patron of the Gail Trust, was convicted of child sexual abuse. In 2011-12 alone, 66 British nationals in India pleaded for help to their consulates in cases of child sex abuse.
last year Union WCD minister Maneka Gandhi had wrote to External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj on Twitter asking for Indian visa rules to be revised so that people with criminal record of child abuse do not enter the country.
The minister's suggestion came soon after American citizen John Kirk Jones was arrested in Hyderabad for distributing child sexual abuse material (CSAM) or child pornography online. Not only did he possess 29,228 CSAM files, Jones also confessed that he had been watching child pornography since childhood.
A proposal for a national register of child sex offenders is reportedly pending before the ministry of home affairs on account of the scope being needed to be enlarged. Many countries, such as the United States, Britain and South Africa keep a record of people who have been convicted of sexual offences such as paedophilia and rape.