PATNA: The girls were kept locked in the upper floors of Muzaffarpur Balika Grih, the shelter home where 34 minor inmates were repeatedly sexually abused, chairperson of Bihar State Commission for Protection of Child Rights told TOI on Saturday.
“The shelter home employees refused to keep the locks open, saying the girls were in a habit of running away,” said Harpal Kaur, who initiated state-wide inspection of children’s homes after she joined the commission in May 2017. There were names of 51 girls in the register, she said, adding “the space allotted to them was very small and lacked even the most basic of amenities.”
Kaur said Madhu Kumari (said to be the accomplice of the main accused Brajesh Thakur who has been arrested for the rape of girls) and one more woman did not leave her alone with the girls despite her repeated requests. “I even said I was like their grandmother. But the girls were under such pressure that they did not even hint about whatsoever was happening to them. A few girls cried, but did not state the reason for it despite persuasions. I asked them things like whether they were not getting food. Had I been given even any inkling about the heinous acts, I would have lodged an FIR then and there,” the commission chief said.
So, in its report submitted to the state social welfare department in November 2017, the commission could only indicate about the “lack of basic amenities” in the home. The commission had recommended that the girls be shifted to another shelter home, but to no avail.
Incidentally, an FIR in the case was lodged by the social welfare department on May 31, five days after it “saw” the report of the Mumbai-based Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS) about the sexual abuse of the girls. “The
TISS report was released at a May 26 meeting which was also attended by the principal secretary of the social welfare department. But the FIR was lodged on May 31,” according to the Muzaffarpur police’s investigation report.
The investigation into the case was later handed over to the CBI.
