The State police to check forced abduction of children from Gumla and lohardga, stressed on bringing in development measures to give the villagers a feel of sense of security. Special Branch of State police, in its report to the DGP on the issue, has reportedly stated that inspite of inputs of child abduction from three blocks of Gumla and lohardaga was provided to the district police, no proper action was taken by them in this regard.
“Although no FIR has been lodged in this regard, but we have reports that children from the three blocks of Gumla and lohardaga are being taken away by the Naxal outfits to induct them into their cadres who are generally used as couriers or as human shields in case they are intercepted by the security forces during the anti-Naxal operations,” asserted a senior police official in the State police requesting anonymity.
The Jharkhand High Court, taking a strong note on newspaper reports that Children were being forcefully taken away by the CPI (Maoists) to induct them into their cadres, took suo-motto cognizance on Thursday issuing notices to Union and State Governments along with various other departments of the State Government asking them to reply within a week.
According to the police officials, since the problem persists in the region since 2013, more needs to be done other than anti-Naxal operations creating an environment for a healthy and dignified life by running area specific development plans in those particular areas.
“A 2.25 crore Banalat Development Plan on the lines of Saranda and Saryu Action Plan is being launched for Banalat region of Gumla for providing better road connectivity, employment opportunities and basic amenities to provide better living conditions to the villagers,” said the official.
He further added that dreadfulness of horrible living conditions of the area could be gauged by the fact that less than one per cent of the land in the region is currently having crops due to lack of irrigation facilities resulting into mass migration from the area to other places in search of menial jobs.
“Only 40 per cent of 40,000 acres of land is cultivated out of 80,000 acres of total land area located in 31 villages of 4 Panchayats in Banalat region,” the official.
Another official however, stressed on roping in education and health departments to check the problem of forced abduction of children from the remote villages.
“It would not be decent for the men in uniform to go to the girl’s parents and ask for their whereabouts, but at the same time, no one will object if they ask such questions from their parents,” said another SP rank official in the state police. Moreover, he said, police cannot keep a track of those children, who are recovered and sent back to their homes.
Besides that, proper awareness campaign asking the parents not to come under pressure of the Naxal outfits should be done in the area taking confidence building measures showing the presence of government agencies giving them a feel of sense of security among the villagers.
Police action unaccompanied by the other government agencies could not be the proper mechanism to tackle such a grave situation faced by the villagers of some of the remote areas in the state, added the official. He however, said that adequate action is being taken by the police to recover the children on the basis of the list made available to them by various sources.
The police, in July 2014, had accepted that the Maoists have taken away as many as 40 children from their villages and killed at least 40 people who opposed to hand over their children to them.
Earlier in September 2013 also, the issue was highlighted after a group of eleven 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 lathar after they failed to pay a fine of `5000 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.
According to the 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.