MOST KIDS ORPHANED BY COVID IN MP, BIHAR AND UP
NEW DELHI: The National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) has found that the greatest number of children orphaned during the Covid-19 pandemic last year were in Madhya Pradesh, followed by Bihar and Uttar Pradesh.
According to an affidavit filed by the child rights body in the Supreme Court on Monday, 318 children were orphaned between March last year and May 29 this year in Madhya Pradesh. In Bihar, the number of such children was 292, followed by Uttar Pradesh, where the number was 270.
These states were followed by Telangana (123), Andhra Pradesh (103) and Chhattisgarh (102).
The government has introduced several schemes to help such children, including PM CARES For Children where For children who lost both or one parent, the government will create a corpus of ₹10 lakhs in the form of a fixed deposit. This
will be used to provide the children a monthly stipend after they turn 18 for five years, “PM CARES will contribute… to create a corpus of ₹10 lakh for each child… This corpus will be used to give a monthly financial support/ stipend from 18 years of their age, for the next five years … and on reaching the age of 23 years, he or she will get the corpus amount as one lump-sum for personal and professional use,” a statement from the Prime Minister’s office said.
The children’s education will be supported by admission to Kendriya Vidayalas and private schools. They will also be assisted in obtaining education loans for professional courses or as an alternative a scholarship will be provided, equivalent to tuition fees, under central or state government schemes.
Going by the NCPCR affidavit, the total number of children who were orphaned or lost a parent in the pandemic is 9,346, of whom 1,742 have been orphaned and 7,464 have lost one parent. Hindustan Times reported on Wednesday that the Supreme Court found discrepancies in the data uploaded on the NCPCR website, Bal Swaraj, and anticipated that a far higher number of children were impacted by the pandemic.
The issue of children orphaned by Covid-19 became a flashpoint during the second wave of the pandemic when posts about such children did the rounds of social media, and some tried to adopt them before the government said such moves were in violation of existing laws governing adoption. According to the ministry of women and child development, 577 children were orphaned between April and May this year. But some experts argue that the number could be much higher.
Enakshi Ganguly, co-founder of HAQ: Centre for Child Rights said that the methodology to calculate the number of such children has not been made clear by anyone so there is no way of knowing what the real numbers are. “Thousands of children are going to drop out of schools, what will the government do about that,” Ganguly said. “It seems the government’s decisions are window dressing. We need to reassess the entire concept of ‘Covid orphans’.”
The most number of affected children, 2,110 , are in Uttar Pradesh, according to NCPCR. Of them, 270 were orphaned, 1,380 lost one parent, and 10 were abandoned.
This is followed by Bihar, with 1,327 children of whom 292 were orphaned and 1,035 lost a parent. Kerala is third on the list, with 952 children of whom 49 were orphaned, 895 lost a parent and eight were abandoned.
Maharashtra is fourth in this list with 796 affected children of whom 80 were orphaned and 716 lost one parent.
Data also shows that 4,860 boys and 4,486 girls lost at least one parent. The greatest number of impacted children are between the ages of eight and 13 (3,711), followed by 16-17 (1,712), 14-15 (1,620), four and seven (1,515), and zero to three years (788).
The Commission said in its affidavit that children who have lost one of their parents, and where the surviving one is of limited means, need help. “Therefore, it is necessary that the children who are living with (their) surviving single parent are given the benefit of government implemented schemes and financial assistance.”
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