3 children go missing from Bahadurgarh shelter home

Ravinder Saini

Tribune News Service

Jhajjar, November 29

Three inmates aged around 12 years went missing under mysterious circumstances from Bal Grah (children home), a shelter home for the destitute and abandoned children, at Sector 6 in Bahadurgarh town in the past two days.

Though the police have initiated efforts to locate the missing children after registering a case in this regard, they have failed to get any clue about their location yet.

The State Commission for Protection of Child Rights (SCPCR) has taken a serious note of the incident and sought a report from the police and administrative authorities in this regard. A team of the SCPCR is likely to visit the children home tomorrow for inspecting the arrangements made by the authorities concerned to ensure the security of inmates.

As per complaint lodged by Saroj, Superintendent of Bal Grah, Harender along with some other children had, as usual, gone to government school in Saakhol village on Thursday morning, but did not return after school hours, while Mohit and Sunil went missing when they were playing outside the children home on Friday evening, said Virender Singh, in charge of Sector 6 police post.

“We had sent the pictures of missing children to nearby police stations, besides bus stand and the railway station to find out any clue about their location,” the in charge said, adding that a special team had been formed to trace them.

District Child Welfare Officer (DCWO) Anar Singh Dahiya said besides the police, investigation was also being made by the Jhajjar SDM on his level to find out the reasons which forced the children to flee.

“Mohit and Sunil had also fled from the children home some months ago. They were recovered from Panipat after some days. A reply has been sought from the staff deputed at the children home about the incident,” Dahiya said, adding that the children home had 30 inmates, including 23 males and seven females.

Meanwhile, BK Goyal, member of the SCPCR, said taking a suo moto action over the incident, the Jhajjar SP had been asked to make sincere efforts to trace the missing boys at the earliest.

“I along with other officials will visit the children home tomorrow to take stock of the situation,” said Goyal.