Thiruvananthapuram: There is no proof yet that children from other state who inhabit the privately-run orphanages in the state are truly orphans or have come from a poor financial background. None of the private orphanages seem to possess the mandatory 'destitution certificates' these children are supposed to get from the village officer of the village from which they hail.
"We have no idea of the socio-economic profile of the children in these orphanages," said a top Social Justice Department official. "But going by looks, it seems these kids come from a poor background," the official said.
An other-state orphan or non-orphan should be admitted to an orphanage only after securing a 'Destitution Certificate' from the village officer of the village from which the boy or girl hails. The insistence on a certificate to prove the destitute condition of the child was introduced nearly a year ago on June 22, 2013, through an amendment to the Orphanages and Other Charitable Homes (Supervision and Control) Act, 1960.
The amendment was made after it was found that there was large-scale unregulated transportation of other-state children to the some of the orphanages in the state. The Board of Control for Orphanages, constituted under the 1960 Act, had examined the matter in detail two years ago and had reported that there were no regulations to control orphanages involved in such transportation.
After the Railway Police had detained people transporting other-state children to the state in the last year, the Social Justice Department is trying in vain to secure "destitution certificates" from orphanages involved to verify the details of their other-state inmates. Official sources said that none of the orphanages have produced such certificates. "Even in the case of cattle, a pass from the Animal Husbandry Department of a state is required to transport them from that state to another," the official said.
Moreover, it has been found that none of the homes that lodge children from other states have submitted an application seeking to protect other-state children and a list and identification of inmates to the Board of Control of Orphanages as mandated by the Orphanages Act, 1960.
