Three minor runaway girls traced, sent to Nari Niketan

Bijendra Ahlawat

Tribune News Service

Faridabad, August 18

Officials of the Child Welfare Council (CWC) and the local police recovered three runaway minor girl inmates of a Bal Greh (Child Shelter Home) of Bahadurgarh, from the Old Faridabad railway station here Friday night. The girls have been sent to the Nari Niketan at Karnal.

The girls aged between 14 and 17 years had allegedly fled the Bal Greh on Thursday night and reached Panipat. They boarded a train for Mumbai from the Panipat station.

“Four girls had fled the shelter home on an assurance by one of them, who hails from Panipat, that they would get jobs and accommodation in Mumbai. Three of them had actually taken the train for Mumbai from Panipat, while the Panipat girl decided to stay back,” said police sources.

However, the police, officials of the Bal Greh and the Child Welfare Council managed to trace the trio by tracking their mobile phone calls and recovered them from the Old Faridabad station around 8 pm on Friday. They were produced before Harish Malik, Chairman, District Child Welfare Council (CWC), who asked them about the reason for fleeing the shelter home. “While none of them complained of harassment or torture at the Bal Greh, they revealed their plan to shift to Mumbai on an assurance given by the fourth inmate, who hails from Panipat,’’ said Malik.

Though the four girls had gone to Panipat from Bahadurgarh, three of them took the train for Mumbai on Friday. They reportedly planned to go to Mumbai to find jobs as the mother of one of them lives there.

The Bal Greh at Bahadurgarh has 26 minor inmates at present and a majority of them belong to poor families. They are either abandoned children or orphans.

Bal Krishan Goel, Member, State Commission for Protection of Child Rights, Haryana, said that the inmates had been safely recovered with the help of the CWC and the anti-human trafficking cell of the police.

Three of them had been sent to the Nari Niketan, Karnal, while the fourth had been handed over to her family, he added.