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Case-Studies

20. Case of child beggars:
Case 1:
5 child acrobats.

During outreach, Madurai CHILDLINE team came across 5 children in the age group of 10 to 16 years performing acrobatics such as passing their body through an iron ring, walking on their hands upside down, etc.

CHILDLINE team members brought the matter to the notice of the police. The children were brought to the CHILDLINE Centre. In their statement they expressed that they were made to beg by their parents. CHILDLINE contacted their parents and brought them to the center.

The parents were provided with counselling and warned not to send them for begging. CHILDLINE has assured to provide assistance for education of the children.

Case 2: Two and half year old.

11Th January 2006 RPF called CHILDLINE Trivandrum and reported spotting a man with a child, begging near the Trivandrum railway station. CHILDLINE team visited the spot and identified a 40-year-old man with a two and half year old boy. The child had cigarette burns on his body and his leg was fractured. He was crying inconsolably.

When questioned the man initially replied that the child was his but later revealed that he had picked up his neighbours child in Bihar. The man's behaviour was observed to be abnormal. The child, along with the, man was produced before the CJM. The man was taken into police custody and the child was taken to the hospital. Under observation it was found that the man was mentally ill and was admitted in the Psychiatric ward. The child underwent treatment in the hospital for two days and has been placed at the Kerala Child Welfare Council Home.

Following this case the CJM called for a meeting of Police, Social Welfare Departments officials and NGO's. During the meeting an order, "Prevention of Begging in Trivandrum", was passed and the police were given the authority to arrest adults using children for begging. Stickers and banners were printed and displayed at bus stands, shops, hospitals, railway stations, and on public transport such as buses, trains, auto rickshaws, etc. Arrested adults would be sent to jail and children to Children's Home. The Corporation has taken up the initiative of setting shelter home for beggars