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Child-friendly police station inaugurated in Pune
The city police are working closely with Hope for Children Foundation, NGO
The city’s first “child-friendly” police station was inaugurated at the cantonment police station premises by Abhay Karandikar, director, Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), on Monday.
The mandate for a “child-friendly” police station arisen out of Juvenile Justice Act 2015 outlines the steps to be taken for the protection of rights of children in need of care and protection as well as for the children in conflict with the law.
Amitabh Gupta, Pune police commissioner, said, “Such police station will provide the necessary safety and security to the juveniles apprehended in different cases where they will be counselled and provide necessary protection under the ambit of the Juvenile Justice Act.”
The city police are working closely with Hope for Children Foundation, NGO working in the field of juvenile justice in Pune and across different parts of the country.
“We will follow a standard format mandated by the Juvenile Justice Act while dealing with cases related to children in conflict with the law. Establishing “child-friendly” police station will enable our staff to deal with the issue more effectively in sensitive cases where children are involved and will provide a safe environment to them,” he said.
The current police station is dedicated space spruced up with latest arrangements where the children can feel at ease in a supportive environment. A special team of police officers with necessary expertise have been assigned to the police station to look after the sensitive unit.
Caroline Ador of Hope for Children Foundation said, “The police stations are the first in the line of interface with the children and the new facility would provide the much-required intervention in the administration of juvenile justice without fear and intimidation while dealing with serious juvenile related crimes like child marriage, child abuse, neglect and exploitation and other crimes.”
Karandikar said, “ The said project should be replicated in all commissionerates and police stations across the state of Maharashtra. We are working closely working with the police departments in areas like CCTV footage monitoring and analysis and drone technology. We believe the power of technology in providing justice to the citizens.”
Bacchan Singh, DCP (crime), said, “In view to curb the growing participation of juveniles in crime, an initiative called “Keep moving movement” was started to provide counselling to the juveniles along with the Life School Foundation was started in 2019. At least 2,693 children have been counselled and provided skill-based training on various topics like mobile repairing, AC repairing, computer hardware repairing among others in all nine heads to 23 juveniles that have helped them to improve their skills.”
As many as 276 offences were registered against juveniles in 2019 and 175 in 2020 (till last week), according to data provided by officials.
