Parents approach cops for rescued children
Following the rescue of minor girls from the brothels at Yadagirigutta, the temple town of Telangana, two couples approached the police asking them to hand over their daughters who went missing a few months ago.
Matham Dibbaiah and Visranthamma of Markapuram in Prakasham district of Andhra Pradesh and Anuradha and Krishna of ECIL in the city, went to the Yadagirigutta police on Friday to take their girl children back. Dibbaiah and Visranthamma claimed to be the parents of Mahitha (name changed), while Krishna and Anuradha claimed Nandini (name changed) was their daughter. They carried the photographs of their daughters and showed it to the police.
In three days, the police rescued 15 minor girl children from various brothels, out of whom 10 were aged below eight years. The police have alerted their counterparts to share information about the missing children.
Though the police found that the pictures with the claimants had matched the rescued girls, they did not want to risk giving the children to the wrong people. They told the claimants that the girls would be handed over only if the DNA (Deoxyribonucleic acid) matched. Yadadri inspector P Ashok Kumar said, "The parents came today seeking the custody of their children. The pictures of the children were a near match, but as per the law, the parents will be given the child's custody only after the DNA matches. The samples of DNA will be collected and sent for analysis at the Forensic Sciences Laboratory in Hyderabad.”
Sunitha Krishnan, co-founder of Prajwala, an NGO that rescues, rehabilitates and re-integrates victims of sex-trafficking, said, The recent incident at Yadagirigutta is very alarming, as the youngest of the rescued kids is only three years old. It is the right time to understand that the demand for children, especially pre-teens, is on the rise and act accordingly to prevent them from becoming victims. About 45 per cent of the sex-trafficking victims are teenagers and pre-teen girls. The gangs, similar to the recently busted ones, can kidnap the children from anywhere.”