Cyberabad Police Rescued 461 Children Last Month

Hyderabad: The Cyberabad Police rescued 461 children including 81 girls in January under the ‘Operation Smile – VIII’ drive conducted across the commissionerate.

As per instructions from the Ministry of Home Affairs, the police had formed nine Operation Smile teams in the three zones which work throughout the year to rescue children from child labour, begging, rag-picking, etc. In the drive conducted from January 1 to 31, 214 children from Telangana and 247 children from other States across the country were rescued.

According to the police, of the children rescued, while some were sent to rescue homes, others were handed over to their parents. Of the 461 children, 422 were rescued from child labour, 22 from begging, 10 from rag-picking and seven from the streets. Among these children, many belong to other States, including Odisha, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan.

A total of 54 cases were registered against persons using children for labour and begging and other offences.

In one incident, a plastic warehouse was raided in Mailardevpally from where 10 children were rescued while eight other children were rescued from a hotel in Mailardevpally. “They were working as child labour since a year for a meagre wage of Rs 200 per day. They were brought from Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh,” an official said.

Officials found that Covid safety precautions were not followed where these children were working and the conditions were unhygienic. Three children were also rescued from their mother who was forcibly making them to beg on the streets and in another incident, 16 children working under hazardous conditions in a brick kiln were rescued from Dundigal.

Apart from this, a one-year-old girl was rescued from a woman, who used her for begging at Chintal. “They were forced to work under unhygienic conditions and crammed into small rooms. They were neither provided proper food nor leave. These children aged in their early and mid-teens were suffering from skin diseases and other health issues. When checked, a few of them were tested positive for Covid-19 too,” the official said.

The rescued children were produced before the Child Welfare Committee (CWC) and later sent to various shelter homes and handed over to their parents.

---

Next Story: