Efforts needed to trace addresses of missing kids

CLUELESS Many kids from other cities and states staying at Lucknow shelter homes for 7-8 years as officials have no clear idea about their address

LUCKNOW: Raman, (name changed), 10, has been living in a city shelter home for three years now. But no one has been able to locate his family and send him back home. While Raman has blurred memories of his home and parents, he often recalls his village and fun with friends.

There are many children in the shelter homes of Lucknow who belong to other districts and states. Many of them have been living at the homes for 7 or 8 years. Officials at the homes say that the children live at the shelter home for long only if they are not in a position to disclose their address or they have a very weird idea about their villages.

Saumya, a counsellor who has helped trace addresses of many children said, “It really requires time and patience to be able to get the links. Often it takes months. A child give some clues and then it is the duty of the counsellor or the home’s staff to locate the family of the child and send him back.”

In a recent meeting held in New Delhi, it was discovered that a number of children from Uttar Pradesh were housed in various rescue homes in Delhi. The children were never brought back to the state because of complex formalities and laidback attitude of the authorities who did not make efforts to locate the homes of the children.

However, the home department has sought a list of such children and has promised to initiate a process that would send the children back to their states.

Currently, there are nearly 10 children of other states living in the government shelter home for boys on Mohaan Road. Around 50 children are from other districts of UP. At the government girls’ home in Moti Nagar too, around 10 girls are from other states, according to sources at the home.

As per the rules, if the families of children who belonged to other states could not be traced, they should be sent to the shelter home in the capital city of the state they belonged to, said a Childline volunteer.

The volunteer claimed that right from the time a child was found, the Childline made all possible efforts to trace his/ her family.

The child was made to stay in the government shelter home only if there were no clues and the child was unwilling to go back.