The Investigating Officer for the case says the CCTV footage was checked and his phone location was traced but to no avail. The investigation is still on. (Representational Image)Written by Pallavi Singhal
The Panchkula police is facing a new challenge these days. Not a day goes by when they do not receive a missing person case. In the last six months, over 189 missing person cases were filed, a big jump from 175 cases filed in all of last year. But the good news is that it has succeeded in solving 144 of these cases. An SHO said most of these cases relate to young girls eloping to marry a boy of their choice against the wishes of their parents. “They return after getting married.” the SHO said.
But there are cases that remain unsolved. In one such case, a 72-year-old man went missing from an ashram in Burali he used to frequently visit on January 14. He had left for his satsang in the morning and was supposed to be back by late evening. When he did not return, his only son got worried and looked for him everywhere. He then filed cases in police stations of Harjor, Rohtak, Nangal and Panchkula as these are the places his father used to visit. The man also has two grandsons who still await his return every day.
The Investigating Officer for the case says the CCTV footage was checked and his phone location was traced but to no avail. The investigation is still on.
But most of the cases involve runaway couples. In one such case, the parents of a girl living in Sector 23, filed a missing persons report. The police looked for her for two days, after which the girl herself walked into the police station with a boy and told them she wanted to get married to him. Her family was pressuring her to get married to someone else and that is the reason she ran away.The case was then closed.
There have been a few incidents where they did not return. In one such case, a woman, aged 35, came from Shimla to visit her sister in-law. On the second day of her visit, she went missing and the sister-in-law registered aPanchkula report in the police station nearby. During investigating, it was found that the woman had run away with her 22-year-old boyfriend leaving behind her three children, one of whom was just one-and-a-half years old. The police managed to trace her and bring her back but she ran away again. The case was registered in February and still remains unsolved.
Rajesh Gill, Prof. Sociology, PU, says, “Children want and demand independence. There is an increased intermixing of the two sexes in this generation. Children are not robots where they will only do what they are told to. There lies a huge difference between their family and social cultures. Most of the times both contradict each other and children bend towards their peer culture as it is more tempting. Girls are the ones who have always been restricted. Boys can do anything without any restrictions. The girls now demand freedom,” she said.
The Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act 2012, is applied in cases where the missing person is a minor. If the girl who missing is under 18, and has been involved in any kind of sexual relationship, the boy is arrested under this act.
