Delhi: 21 kids went missing daily in first six months of 2015

On an average, 21 children went missing daily in the first six months this year from the national capital, according to government data.

On an average, 21 children went missing daily in the first six months this year from the national capital, according to government data.

Minister of state for home Haribhai Chaudhary told the Rajya Sabha that a total of 3,889 children, including 1,715 boys and 2,174 girls went missing from Delhi between January 1 and June 30 this year, of which over 1,500 children are yet to be traced by the police.

In reply to a question from Congress member Motilal Vora, the minister said 2,337 of the missing children were traced, but 610 boys and 942 girls remained untraced.

The minister, however, said no data was maintained centrally about children missing from the National Capital Region (NCR) outside the National Capital Territory (NCT) of Delhi.

Chaudhary said the Delhi Police have launched project ‘SNEH’ to tackle the problem of missing children. Juvenile welfare officers at police stations work in close coordination with NGOs and undertake awareness campaigns under the scheme, he said.

In another reply, few days ago, the minister had informed Parliament that one child goes missing in nearly every eight minutes in the country. Chaudhary had then stated that out of these missing children, around 44% have remained untraceable and around 60% of all missing children are girls.

Found on the web

As many as 140 of around 1,500 cases of missing children reported on portal ‘Khoya-Paya’ have been closed since the launch of the website by ministry of women and child development in June, the government said on Thursday.

“The website reported around 1,500 cases of missing/sighted children. Approximately, 2,700 users have registered on the portal and around 1,500 have downloaded mobile application for their mobile phones,” Union minister for women and child development Maneka Gandhi said in a written reply in the Rajya Sabha.

The web portal ‘Khoya-Paya’ was launched by the ministry on June 2 in assistance with the department of electronics and information technology, to help families register details of missing children and citizens to report sightings of children.