Three minor girls escaped from Dongri Children’s Home on Friday evening. The girls, aged between 16 and 17, used tables and a ladder to scale the home’s 15-foot boundary wall. One of the girls returned a few hours later while two remain at large. The authorities believe the girls had wanted to go home for Diwali.

Of the three who ran away, one returned voluntarily to the remand home. “The girl went straight to her Borivli home, but after her family didn’t allow her to stay with them, she went to local police station and informed them she had escaped from Dongri remand home and wanted to go back there. The Borivli police then brought her back,” said Trupti Jadhav-Sankpal, superintendent at Dongri Children’s Home.

The other two girls are yet to be traced. They were both recently admitted to the remand home. One is from Bihar and was found 10 days ago, at Dadar station by the Government Railway Police . The other is from Tamil Nadu and was found by a non-profit organisation at Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus (CST) a few days ago.

According to the police, on Friday evening, the three girls excused themselves saying they needed to go to the bathroom. They took a ladder that authorities believe was on the premises by the Public Works Department (PWD) and tried to use it to scale the 15-foot boundary wall.

When they found it wasn’t tall enough, the girls pulled out a few tables, piled them up and perched the ladder on the tables. They walked on the boundary wall till they reached a spot where they could use a nearby tree to jump on to the roof of an adjoining public toilet and escape.

Authorities of Dongri Children’s Home discovered the girls were missing when they didn’t return from the washroom and a head count was carried out to confirm this. They then informed the police who launched a manhunt.

Senior inspector Sandeep Bhagdikar confirmed the incident and said no offence has been registered against the runaway girls. He said the correction home is conducting its own inquiry. The police said a fourth girl had also planned to run away, but abandoned the plan halfway.

This is the fourth incident of children admitted to Dongri Children’s Home attempting escape in 2018.

In February, five children escaped using a ladder, in a manner similar to the attempt made by the three minor girls on Friday.

First Published: Nov 07, 2018 00:14 IST