Finally, HIV positive siblings get a home

Nitish Sharma
Tribune News Service
Ambala, March 26

After being shuttled from one place to another, two HIV positive minor orphan siblings have finally been provided a shelter at a child care institution in Rai, Sonepat.

The 12-year-old boy and his nine-year-old sister were sent back to Ambala last Wednesday as they were not provided a shelter at a children’s home in Panchkula, and since then they had been staying at a fit facility in Naraingarh. Last night, they were sent to Sonepat.

Mohit Aggarwal, a member of the Child Welfare Committee (CWC), said “The children have been sent to Sonepat with the help of the Women and Child Development Department. The Health Department has assured that it will make all arrangements for their treatment. Two more HIV positive children are already staying there. The children will get treatment from the PGI, Rohtak.”

Finding a shelter for the children had turned out to be a difficult task for the CWC in the absence of a child care institution in Ambala. Besides, lack of support from other districts had created more obstacles for the CWC.

The father of the children had died nearly six months ago, while their mother died on February 25. Relatives had refused to keep them.

Despite the fact that the matter was in the notice of the Women and Child Development Department and the Haryana State Commission for Protection of Child Rights, the children were harassed and shuttled from one place to another. Now, the CWC is likely to raise the matter with the Chief Secretary, Haryana, the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights and also with the National Human Rights Commission.

Gurdev Singh, a CWC member, said “The children are very young and we wanted to keep them together as after the death of their parents, they need the support of each other. We have faced a lot of issues in this particular case and we don’t want the same thing to happen to any other child, especially if there is any HIV positive child case in future; it has been decided to raise the matter with the authorities and commissions concerned.”