Finally, dist gets CWC after four years

Rachna Khaira

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Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, August 7

After a long delay of four years, the Department of Social Security and Women and Child Development has finally constituted District Child Welfare Committees (CWCs) and Juvenile Justice Boards (JJB) in every district of the state. Earlier, the CWC was constituted in 2011 and its tenure was ended in 2014 but its members were told to continue till the constitution of the new committee.

As per the notification, new members of the CWC in Jalandhar include Satinder Mohan Singh Mahal (chairperson), Amarjit Singh Anand (member), Dr Sushma Chawla (member), Roshan Lal, and Sarita Arora.

The JJ Board has Dr Deepali Luthra and Kundan Lal Barna as the members.

As per the provisions of the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2015 (Rules 2016), state governments were required to set up a CWC and a JJ Board in each district under the Integrated Child Protection Scheme (ICPS).

Though the Ministry of Women and Child Development had implemented the ICPS Scheme in 2009 under the JJ Act, 2000, the state could only implement it in 2011.

Punjab began recruitment of officials in 2011. However, the constitution of both CWCs and JJ Boards were mired into controversy after some retired High Court judges challenged the constitution in the Punjab and Haryana High Court. They also raised objections pertaining to the inclusion of government officials as CWC members.

In Jalandhar, former members of the CWCs also failed to deliver results and in a major fiasco, were also allegedly found to have given children in adoption without a valid NOC from the Police Department. It was expected that due to this fiasco, many missing children too may have also been given in adoption to foreign countries.

In a meeting held at the District Legal Services Authority (DLSA) later, the CWC members even claimed helplessness to continue as CWC members and offered to resign.

As per sources, these non-reluctant members were made to continue their jobs till the constitution of the new CWC but the majority of them resigned soon.

Following this, the district administration had to face a lot of trouble in the rehabilitation of lost and abandoned children found in the city. District welfare officials had to run to either Hoshiarpur or Nawashehar to get rehabilitation orders of such children found on a daily basis in the city.