Odisha's Kalahandi shelter home owner arrested

BHAWANIPATNA: The superintendent of a shelter home for HIV-infected children in Odisha’s Kalahandi district was arrested on Monday for allegedly sexually abusing an eight-year-old inmate.
Saroj Das, the superintendent of the shelter home ‘Prayash’, was apprehended after a complaint was lodged by the district Child Welfare Committee(CWC), Bhawanipatna police station’s inspector incharge Satya Nanda said.CWC chairperson Rajesh Nayak said the home has been sealed and all the nine inmates, including five girls, have been shifted.
The girl’s mother had accused Das of sexually abusing her daughter and other inmates, Nayak said. The girl had been staying in the shelter home since August 2016, police said. The woman claimed that she was forced to take her daughter back to Balangir in March after the alleged sexual assault. However, there was no complaint from the girl’s mother at that time, police said. Das has denied the allegation.
SCPCR to probe shelter home horror
The mother of the eight-year-old child, a native of Balangir district, had complained before a section of media two days ago that her daughter was being abused by the shelter home owner.
After taking suo motu cognisance of the media reports, the Kalahandi district administration directed the Bhawanipatna police on Sunday to get their statements recorded. The mother and daughter duo was brought in after midnight around 12.30 am on Monday, and their statements were recorded in front of the special judgement police unit (SJPU) under Sections 161 and 164 of the CrPC.
The Bhawanipatna police also produced them before the child welfare committee, Kalahandi.
The chairperson of the State Commission for Protection of Child Rights , Snadhyabati Pradhan, said she will start an enquiry into the incident. "The allegations are very serious and there is a need for proper inquiry. There are several mechanisms for monitoring these child care institutions at district level as well as state level. We have to find out where were the lapses. I would personally visit the victim and conduct an inquiry," Pradhan said.
Elaborating on the mother and daughter's statements, Bhawanipatna Town police station incharge, Satya Narayan Nanda, said, "The survivor's mother stated that she had come to the shelter home on Shivaratri on March 4 this year and at that time her daughter told her about the sexual exploitation."
"The mother went back home, but came back on March 25 to the institution and pleaded with the child welfare committee to allow her to take her daughter home. At that time the mother had not made any allegations," Nanda added. The minor was admitted to the shelter in 2016.
Das, the shelter home owner, denied the allegations saying her mother wanted to defame the institution, which was established in 2015 without any government aid.
The shelter home has been shut down by the administration and all nine inmates have been shifted to a temporary home in Bhawanipatna. The district child protection officer, Sailendu Kumar Mahapatra, said they will be shifted to a government-run home in Ganjam.