Court asks police to probe child trafficking gangs (Lead)
March 16th, 2011 - 9:04 pm ICT by IANSNew Delhi, March 16 (IANS) The Delhi High Court Wednesday took a serious view of police failure to trace missing children and directed the Delhi Police chief to constitute a task force to find out if gangs were involved in child trafficking.
The division bench of Chief Justice Dipak Misra and Justice Sanjiv Khanna pulled up police while referring to a report filed by the Delhi Legal Services Authority stating that over 500 children missing over the past one year have not been rescued.
The court directed deputy commissioners of police of all police districts to monitor cases related to missing children.
Gangs involved in child labour and trafficking were active in all parts of the city but police were not carrying out proper investigations, the bench observed.
“If any missing child is not rescued by police, the probe will be handed over to the anti-kidnapping cell,” the bench said.
The court directed the Delhi Police commissioner to initiate a standard procedure to inform the police station concerned as well as Police Control Room vans about missing children and make an endeavour to engage more officers for tracing victims.
The bench asked police to keep track of rescued children so that they do not get victimised again.
Taking note of the fact that schools struck off names of the children who went missing, the court directed the education department of the Delhi government to issue a circular to all schools that they should not do this.
“The children would continue with the study after being rescued. Removing a child’s name from school list is not the solution,” said the bench.
The court was hearing a matter taken up on its own initiative following media report that every year several children in the city go missing and police do not take appropriate action.
On Jan 19, the DLSA submitted a report that more than 500 children missing for the past one year have not yet been traced.
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Tags: chief justice, child labour, child trafficking, delhi government, delhi high court, delhi police, deputy commissioners, dipak, division bench, dlsa, education department, gangs, jan 19, misra, missing child, missing children, police commissioner, police districts, police station, sanjiv