THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Right at the centre of the busy Ayur Junction in Kollam is placed a large hoarding of the seven-year-old girl, who was abducted, raped and killed by the paramour of her aunt late last month. On top of the little girl’s smiling photograph is written ‘mappu’ (‘our apologies’). The hoarding was put up by a local youth club, but it can also be read as Kerala society’s collective sigh of helplessness. According to law enforcers, any missing child can be saved if the search operation is initiated within an hour from the moment the child disappeared. Police call this the ‘golden hour’. The rationale is that during the ‘golden hour’ the child, whether she is alone or has been smuggled out, will be within a 10-km radius from where she had left or been taken, be it school or home. The girl in Ayur was found 24 hours later, her body dumped in an obscure forest off Anchal-Kulathupuzha road, the spot well within the 10-km radius of her home in Eloor.
What is alarming is, even if the information of the missing child is promptly passed on, the state’s policing system does not have in place a quick response mechanism. Such an alert system can do wonders. Three days ago, a 12-year-old girl from Karamana in Thiruvananthapuram was spotted alone at the railway station by the Railway Protection Force. She had a ticket to Thrissur. The girl said that her parents had died in an accident and that she was going to live with her close relatives in Thrissur. The RPF sent an alert to all police stations within the city limits, the girl’s photograph was also ‘WhatsApped’ to station heads. There was a swift response from the Karamana police station. A couple, desperately searching for the missing child, identified the girl as their daughter. As it turned out, the girl felt left out after she had a baby brother and had left the house in anger. She did not have any relatives in Thrissur.
The RPF had strengthened their child surveillance after three plus two girls committed suicide by jumping from a train last year. A ‘child rescue booth’ has also been set up at Thiruvananthapuram Railway Station. The Social Justice Department was also jolted into action after the deaths of two sisters at Walayar in Palakkad on January 12 and March 4 this year. The post mortem found evidence of sexual abuse but the police insisted that both the girls had committed suicide. One was 16 and the other 11. Sufficiently provoked, Social Justice Minister K K Shylaja announced the creation of a Fast Response Team in each district to deal with child-related cases. The team was to be formed with representatives from the police, social justice, health and local self government departments. Ms Shylaja said that vehicles would also be put at their disposal. After the intensity of the moment died down, she seems to have lost interest. No order was issued and the Fast Response Team remains on paper.
Even the special juvenile police unit (SJPU), mandated by the Juvenile Justice Act, has not been formed. “Most police stations do not have a unit dedicated to children. A station is burdened by hundreds of cases and it is only understandable that in the chaos child missing cases are largely ignored,” said Mr K Subair, the Thiruvanan-thapuram District Child Protection Officer. In such a situation, even when the station is informed of a missing child, immediate action is virtually impossible. Police sources say the force is short of manpower to have a separate unit for children. However, SJPUs, though in a very skeletal form, function in Ernakulam and Kozhikode districts. Each unit has four members and is headed by a woman circle inspector. Even in its rudimentary form it is effective.
“We deal solely with children. We get 10 to 12 calls daily and we promptly inform the police stations concerned,” said Mr Mohammed Ashraf, a policeman attached to the SJPU (Kochi rural). “We might not have a large force at our command but we can constantly monitor cases,” he said. The SJPU also keeps vulnerable children under close watch. “School counsellors, teachers and even parents tell us to keep an eye out for vulnerable kids,” Mr Ashraf said. In places where there are no dedicated units for children, which is the case of almost the entire state, Child Line’s 1098 is the only dependable number. “But even when you call 1098, the call is first picked up by the NGO’s Chennai office. The Chennai office then contacts the branch concerned, which is then supposed to call up the complainant and the police. Then, it is up to the police to take forward the investigation. And a force handicapped by severe staff shortage has no time for missing kids,” a top Social Justice official said. But for how long can we keep apologising for murdered innocents?
SPC’s dos, don’ts to seal loopholes
In the wake of declining conviction rate in cases under Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO), state police chief Loknath Behera has prescribed a set of instructions to plug loop holes during probe and ensure arrest of convicts. According to the directive, since the chances for witnesses turning hostile are high in cases in which accused is a family member of the victim, it should be mandatory to record statement of doctors and social workers who initially interact with the victim. Mr. Behera also suggested that scientific evidences should be collected to the maximum possible extent to ensure that there was no loophole for the accused. All the statements should be recorded in audio or video format.
The SPC also instructed in the circular that any sort of mental trauma to the victim child should be avoided and questions that recollect fearful incidents the victim suffered should be avoided. A victim should be kept at a shelter home only if there was no possibility to keep the child with family or any relatives. Mr. Behera also wanted the police officers to complete investigation in POCSO cases on a time bounded manner. A 13-point dos and don'ts have been also prescribed by the SPC to the investigation officers. According to sources, the conviction rate of POCSO case in the state was only around 20 percent.
‘Enlist help from auto, taxi drivers’
The authorities of Nirbhaya homes in the state for sexually abused girls constantly live under the scare of an inmate, mostly minor girls, going missing any moment. P.E. Usha, the state project director of Mahila Samakhya Society that runs 8 of the 11 Nirbhaya homes in the state, said that the Society had evolved its own aggressive ways of searching for a missing girl. “Whenever a girl goes missing we make frantic calls to the police and provide them with all necessary information about the girl’s identity,” Ms Usha said. She also makes it a point to rush to the control room of the Railway Protection Force (RPF) where monitors beam images from 64 CCTV cameras installed within the Thiruvananthapuram Railway Station.
“I will sit there with the policemen and monitor the visuals. At least in five cases we had identified the girl and the train in which she had boarded,” Ms Usha said. “In all these cases we were able to get hold of the girl within 30 minutes, mostly at Varkala station or at the most Kollam,” she added. However, Ms Usha said a larger network has to be created for efficient search. “Traffic policemen, autorickshaw drivers, taxi drivers, bunk shop owners and even porters should be enlisted in this mission,” she said. “There were innumerable instances where auto drivers came with us during the search,” she said. Innovative thinking can also do the trick. Last year when a girl was found missing, the Home authorities deduced that the girl had travelled to Kattakada. The police quickly asked for the mobile numbers of all KSRTC conductors employed on that route on the day. The girl was traced in two hours.
