Shahbad Dairy, Narela: Police data reveals the most unsafe areas for kids in Delhi

Crime against children: Police data reveals names of localities from where maximum kidnapping cases are reportedVatsala Shrang

In May 2016, a 13-year-old boy and his nine-year-old brother went missing from their home in outer Delhi’s Shahbad Dairy. While the younger one is still missing, the elder sibling returned home around a year and a half later. In that one “traumatic” year, the teenager — who has joined school again this year — found himself sedated, in another state, forced into begging and burnt multiple times on the head, fingers and toes. Until one day, when he got lucky — and found his way back home.

As per records, at least 3,321 children were rescued from the two stations in the last three years. This year till June, the railway police rescued 323 children.(Arun Sharma/HT Photo)

Such an incident is, however, not unusual for people living in this part of the city. Almost every second house in places such as Shahbad Dairy, Narela and Samaypur Badli, among others, has reported cases of children going missing. In fact, the three areas have topped the list of 20 police stations in Delhi that have recorded the highest number of cases pertaining to missing children in 2017.

While some of the children have returned, families of the others longingly hope and pray that their missing loved ones would return someday.

Almost two years after he went missing, the boy said he and his brother tried to run away because they were scared of getting scolded at home for not attending a tuition class. He said they sat on a bus going towards Samaypur Badli and got down only at the last stop, a local railway junction, from where they travelled to New Delhi railway station.

But the “huge crowd” on the platform, he said, separated them. His memory is fuzzy as to what happened thereafter. He remembers waking up hours later, sedated, in a train next to a man, who took him to a house, somewhere in West Bengal, and stuffed him into a large room with around 30 other children.

“We would beg during the days and clean and cook at nights. Once, I saw the man beat up one of the boys and cut the fingers off of a girl. Petrified, two of us — another boy who was confined in the room and I — ran for kilometres to reach the nearest railway station the next day. We sat on a train to Delhi,” the boy said, sitting outside his house with his mother, who said she has given up her job as a domestic help just to look after her son.

According to the police, cases under kidnapping charges are registered when children go missing. Such cases are mostly recorded in 20 police stations in the city: Shahbad Dairy, Samaypur Badli, Narela, Jaitpur, Vijay Vihar, Uttam Nagar, Bhalaswa Dairy, Sangam Vihar, Dabri, Khajuri Khas, Karawal Nagar, New Usmanpur, New Ashok Nagar, Mehrauli, Begampur, Bindapur, Burari, Kapashera, Gokalpuri and Seemapuri.

In 2017, 152 missing children’s cases were registered in Shahbad Dairy, of which only 110 could be solved — and the children traced. In Narela, 189 such cases were registered, of which 126 were cracked. In Samaypur Badli, meanwhile, 153 children had gone missing, of whom 76 have been found.

In 2016, Shahbad Dairy registered 162 such cases, followed by Samaypur Badli, where 161 such cases were recorded and Ranhola in west Delhi, where 138 such cases were registered.

On the street next to the house of the 13-year-old boy, who everyone claims have had a lucky escape, a 12-year-old had gone missing four years ago. “It has been a little over four years since my younger brother went missing. His classmates, who were the last ones to see him, said he had left school but he never returned home. Once or twice a year, a policeman visits us to ask if he has returned. We have heard that many children who go missing come back home. I hope my brother also returns one day,” 18-year-old Bhagwan Das, the boy’s elder brother, said.

A common thread that cuts across all these places in outer Delhi, the police said, are that the areas comprise slum clusters and unauthorised colonies, where children mostly have to fend for themselves. With a large share of migrant population living in these areas, most residents of these areas move across the city in search of a better livelihood.

The police maintained that these 20 police stations in Delhi receive an average of around 8-10 cases pertaining to children going missing every month.

Sushma Sharma, who works with Nav Srishti, an NGO working to find and rehabilitate missing children, said, “From these areas, children go missing every day. Their parents are poor and mostly uneducated. Most of them are daily wage labourers and are often not able to look after their children for most part of the day.”

The number of children who go missing from these areas is in stark contrast to the number of such cases reported from other parts of Delhi.

In most of the middle- and- upper-middle class neighbourhoods, there are only one or two cases of missing children in a month. For example, upscale residential neighbourhoods such as Defence Colony in south Delhi, hardly registers any such case.

In Narela’s pocket-7, Anjum, a mother of four girls, said her only son, who was then 12, had gone missing one evening in June 2013. She said her son used to help her out at a kiosk that she would set up at a weekly market.

“We were at the market when I suddenly got a call from my in-laws. They said it was an emergency and I had to rush. I told my son to pack up all our stuff and go home. He has not returned ever since. I regret my last words to him so much. I have, since then, spent around ₹15,000 going to mosques and temples, praying for my son’s wellbeing and hoping that he’d return one day,” said Anjum, who has a disability in one of her legs.

In another resettlement pocket in Narela, a 10-year-old had gone missing a few years ago. He is yet to be traced. While HT could not reach the family as they were out of town, their neighbours said every year before elections, they ask political leaders to install CCTV cameras in the area, but their request goes unheard and more and more children go missing.

The problems, Delhi Commission for Protection of Child Rights (DCPCR) officials said, are multifaceted: from socio-economic problems such as lack of protective environment to poverty, which make the children vulnerable to being lured by antisocial elements who force them into beggary and trafficking. Some between the ages of 14 and 15 even run away from their homes in search for a better life. Besides, the officials said, poor infrastructure and lack of technological assistance such as CCTV cameras in these colonies ensure their activities go unmonitored.

“It is a multifaceted problem springing from socio-economic factors. There is no adequate family protection as there is nobody to keep a watch on the children, many of who are not even enrolled in schools, when their parents are out. Moreover, there is not enough social support or security system to engage these children while they are away from the parents’ eyes,” said Ramesh Negi, chairperson, DCPCR.

Hence, the DCPCR, in September this year, started mapping the most vulnerable police stations. “During the exercise, we noticed that a number of cases were from areas where there were ongoing large-scale construction work and labourers from the area were engaged. Investigators find it difficult to follow up with the parents as the families move to other areas for work later,” he said.

Their survey, Negi added, will help identify most critical areas and getting children enrolled either in schools or aanganwadis so that they are in protected environment for most part of the day, following which their parents can take care of them.

DCP (Rohini) Rajneesh Gupta said, “The demographic profile of the area indicates low-income groups, largely living in resettlment colonies, which lack a system of social security. Most of the children, who go missing, however, return home on their own or are traced back.”

The police maintained the number of such cases has come down from 22 children going missing every day in 2015 to 18 in 2017. “The numbers have come down significantly and efforts are being made to trace the others. In around 40-50% cases, the adolescent children having reported missing have come back on their own after not being able to find a better life outside. There are others who are traced with help of a network of child care institutions. The number of those falling prey to beggary gangs is still less while the highest number of cases is of children reaching the age of 12-13 eloping from their homes to earn a quick buck,” a senior police officer said.

A report on ‘Missing Children in Delhi 2018’, released by the Alliance for People’s Rights (APR) and NGO Child Rights and You (CRY) and published this September, states that while the numbers of missing children in comparison to previous years has reduced, the number of children being traced in Delhi is the worst among other states.

Of every 10 children who go missing in Delhi, six remain untraced, the report states. The reasons, according to the report, are trafficking, being forced into begging and domestic labour, and some cases of elopement. Moreover, the report maintains, the number of missing children between the ages of 12 and 17 is the highest.

Dhananjay Tingle, executive director of NGO Bachpan Bachao Andolan, said, “It is important that families report cases of children going missing at the earliest so that they reach the safety net of the police and the government. The recently launched facial recognition software by the police has helped trace large number of children. Counselling of parents and a child care plan by the government are two big steps needed to help address the issue.”