Statesman News Service
MALDA, Dec. 26: The district administration handed over a total of 37 children and two youths, who were detained under the Immoral Trafficking Act in Bhubaneswar, Orissa, a few days ago, to their guardians this evening.
Although all the children were detained under the Immoral Trafficking Act at Bhubaneswar railway station, the Malda SP, Mr Satyajit Bandyopadhyay, said it was “not a case of trafficking”.
“The fact is that most of the guardians had decided to send their wards to Kerala to be admitted to a madrassa. They were detained by GRP in Orissa on their way to Kerala,” he said before the handover, adding they would hand over the children after verification of the parents/guardians.
The assistant labour commissioner in Malda, Mr PP Das, said: “The children on the train could not show valid papers to Orissa police to establish that they were going to Kerala for studies.” A cleric, educated in the madrassa in question, had suggested sending the children there for better studies free of cost, explained Mr Bandyopadhyay.
The guardians became alarmed when Orissa police detained the children, and approached the district administration to bring them back.
A police team accompanied by an official from the office of the assistant labour commissioner went to Orissa and brought them back to Malda this evening.
Most of the children hailed from Chanchal subdivision in northern Malda district; the rest were from different adjoining blocks.
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