New Delhi, Days after violence broke out in northeast Delhi, the Delhi Commission for Women (DCW) has reunited a two-year-old girl with her family.
The DCW came to know about the minor through media reports following which Commission’s Chief Swati Maliwal handed over the case to the Mahila Panchayat for locating the girl’s family.
Through its local enquiry, the team learnt that the girl was currently staying in a shelter home for the riot victims in Mustafabad with a woman named Suhani (name changed).
When the team reached the Shelter Home and spoke to Suhani, she informed them that she had found the child sitting alone near a mosque in the chaos during the violence. The girl was crying and seemed severely traumatised, she said.
Suhani took the girl with her in view of the tense circumstances. When the Commission’s team spoke to Suhani, she informed the Commission that she did not report the matter to the police since she was afraid to go to the police. She was also reluctant to give back the girl because she was afraid that the girl might not be looked after properly.
DCW Member Firdaus Khan then spoke to Suhani and explained to her that the Commission was making efforts to find the child’s parents. Only then did Suhani agree to hand over the child to the team and police.
The Commission then conducted a joint operation with the police to locate the child’s parents. The Commission’s team went door to door around the area and talked to local people and publicised the information about the missing girl child in the entire area. The team also made announcements about the girl from the mosque near which the girl was found and subsequently after a lot of effort, the girl’s grandfather was traced, who then approached the police station.
The girl’s grandfather said that she was with him when the violence brokeout, but when everyone started running, in the confusion the girl went missing. He said that he and his family had been looking for the girl for the last two to three days.
The girl’s father was then called to the police station where he showed evidence of the girl being his child and after all the paperwork, the girl was safely handed over to her family. The girl’s family was overjoyed when she returned and thanked the Delhi Commission for Women and the police.
Maliwal in a press statement said, “We got the news of this 2-year-old girl child being lost through the media. We immediately formed a team and started searching for the girl’s family. In this case, we got a lot of cooperation from the police.
“DCW Member Firdaus Khan, spoke to Joint Commissioner Alok Kumar, who instructed his team to give full support to DCW. We are very happy that we were able to introduce back the child with the family. I also wish to thank the two important women in this case — Suhani for keeping the child safe until DCW reached and Savita Anand for offering to adopt the child in case her parents were not found.”
