Hyderabad: A day after 220 child labourers were rescued, the South Zone police is now verifying if there were kidnapped children among those rescued. Since the news of the rescue operation, Hyderabad police has been receiving calls from child rights activists and other individuals from Bihar, enquiring about some children who had gone missing from districts like Gaya.
“We received a few calls from Bihar enquiring about the identity of rescued children. They had a list of a few missing kids, and wanted to check if any of the kids were among the victims here. We have asked them to provide details and, if necessary, to come down to Hyderabad,” said South Zone DCP V. Satya-narayana.
Since there are several missing cases in the districts from where most of are children from, the cops need to verify how many children were brought to Hyderabad with their parents’ consent. The police has meanwhile started the process of sending back the children to their parents with the help other government departments and NGOs. Officials said that the rehabilitation process will take a few days and all the concerned government departments are involved in it.
The police have sent all the 19 agents and the manufacturing unit owners, including Yaseen Pehalwan and his two sons, to judicial remand. They will be further questioned later, the cops said. Despite the children being locked up in several buildings and bangle-manufacturing units in the Talabkatta area, no locals had informed the police for a long time. Police officials said that a few locals were aware of the children but they had not informed the police or other enforcement agencies.
“They were scared about the local leader Yaseen Pehalwan, and did not want to get involved in the issue,” said DCP Mr Satyanarayana, adding that some locals might have thought that since the children were from Bihar and not from Hyderabad, there was no need to bother.
