By Express News Service
Published: 13th February 2016 04:54 AM
BENGALURU: To monitor Child Care Institutions, the District Child Protection Unit Bengaluru has come up with a design for an extensive online database.
As part of this, the NGOs are required to furnish all the background information of their institution and of the children staying under their protection.
This will be hosted on the official website of the DWCD. Not just this, they will be required to update the information every three months.
The crucial part of this feature is that it mandates the child care institutions to provide information on where they have sourced the children from and who are the people approaching the institution with children. This would help them bust trafficking of children.
District Child Protection Officer Divya Narayanappa told Express that the identity of the children would be protected and the online database would not be accessible to general public.
Each institution will be given a key to access their file and update it regularly. Only the DCPU officials will have access to it.
Aadhaar Enrolment
Another measure being adopted to keep track of children is to secure Aadhaar numbers for them. Last year, the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) began a drive for giving Aadhaar numbers to children in government homes. DCPU officials said all the children in government homes had secured Aadhaar numbers and now they were extending the same facility to all the CCIs. So far, enrollment for Aadhaar has begun in 22 CCIs in the city and it would be extended to more.
Pan India tracking
The Centre has initiated a pan-India exercise to track orphanages and identify children staying in these institutions. Under the guidance of Childline India Foundation, the Integrated Child Protection Scheme wing in the Department of Women and Child Development is monitoring the programme in State. According to the officials, letters have been issued in this regard to every district and the survey would begin soon.
Need for Orphanage Concept Questioned
The question, “Why do we need the concept of an orphanage?” itself is up for debate. Many people who find it altruistic opine that it is time to redefine the concept. Vasudeva Sharma, Executive Director of city-based NGO Child Rights Trust told Express that until recently people did not ask many questions about orphanages as it was assumed that it was done for a social cause. “People used to fund them. Slowly some people have started using it for self-centered purposes,” he said.
Further, the general consensus among child rights activists and officials is that there are no “orphans”-- the extended family is always around. More importantly, activists say that a majority of the children in orphanages have parents. Gopinath of Sparsha Trust said that in two decades of his experience in the field, he has not met more than 25 children, who do not have anyone to fall back on. This prompts another question: Are orphanages required? Here, Sharma emphasised on the importance of child care institutions. “There is a need for these institutions. However, the accommodation should not be for an indefinite period but only until the children are safely repatriated to their family and surroundings,” he said.