Confused and worried, two of the children burst into tears while they were being interrogated
One of the railway police officers interacts with the Muslim boys detained at the children's centre at Central station. (Photo: DC)
Chennai: Railway police and child welfare officers detained 40 Muslim students along with two of their teachers after finding their presence “suspicious”. The students from Bihar were en route to Bengaluru, where they study at a Madrassa. After mistakenly getting of at Tondiarpet station instead of Perambur station, the students looked confused.
Confused and worried, two of the children burst into tears while they were being interrogated. One of the teachers spoke to DC and said the police had told them that they would give back their tickets once they had checked their background completely.
The students and the teachers had valid identity cards but the authorities alleged they should have had more documents with them and therefore they had to be detained.
While at Tondiarpet, the group was spotted by a staff from the district child protection unit, who contacted the district child protection officer of Chennai, Glory Gunaselvi. The students were then brought to Chennai central station’s child welfare centre and detained for over four hours.
Insisting that the students ID cards were not sufficient proof, the railway police and the child welfare officers, contacted some of the parents of the children and also the Madrassa, who confirmed that the students were indeed on their way to the school. The authorities claimed that all the documents were in Urdu and also there was a communication problem because the authorities could not understand what the students and teachers were saying.
Even though the police and the welfare authorities handed back the tickets, six people including two Childline officers, two RPF and two government railway police have accompanied the children. Glory Gunaselvi said, “When they reach Bangalore, Childline officials there will make a full verification of all their details and only then let the students go.”
When asked for the cause of the detention, Glory Gunaselvi said, “There’s nothing wrong with verification. They didn’t have a proper letter saying why they were travelling, that’s why we had to detain them.”
( Source : deccan chronicle )
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