Police across the country clearly haven’t learnt a lesson from the gruesome Nithari killings. As per information provided by the government, of the 1,17,000 children who went missing in the last three years, over 34,000 have not been still traced.
Union minister of state for home affairs Ajay Maken told parliament on Friday that 1,17,035 children went missing during 2007-2009, of which 34,584 were not traced.
In 2007, 43,167 children disappeared and 32,207 were traced, while in 2008, 41,090 children went missing and 28,942 were traced. In 2009, the number of missing children dipped to 32,778, of which 21,302 were traced.
However, the dip in 2009 figures was not a result of better police work. It was because more than 15 states did not send data on missing children to the home ministry.
Maharashtra, Jharkhand, Orissa and Assam have not provided the home ministry any data on children going missing during 2007-09.
In the three-year period, most, 34,416, children went missing from West Bengal, followed by 27,005 in Madhya Pradesh. Other states with high cases of missing children were Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Gujarat, Karnataka and Chhattisgarh.
Delhi had only 231 reported cases in 2007, of which 128 children were traced. The home ministry did not receive data on Delhi’s missing children in 2008 and 2009.
Explaining the reason for the high number of missing children, Bharti Ali, who works for NGO Haq, said, “Most children who go missing are hired as domestic help. Since there is no coordination among states, the children remain missing.”
There were no reports of missing children in Mizoram in 2007 and 2008 and in Nagaland in 2007.
“We have news of many children missing from Mizoram and Nagaland. But there are no official records because they don’t maintain such records,” Ali said.