Appoint head of state child rights body, NCPCR to Jharkhand governor

RANCHI: National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) chairperson Priyank Kanoongo on Saturday met governor Droupadi Murmu at Raj Bhavan to discuss various initiatives taken by the rights body to combat human trafficking and how Jharkhand can adopt the same to check trafficking and the illegal sale and purchase of children from orphanages, given how both the practices are extremely common in the state.
Kanoongo, on her day-long visit to the state capital, urged the government to reconstitute the headless state child rights body immediately. "The state unit of the child rights body is headless for over 10 months now. This is affecting thousands of cases related to child safety. We urge the state government to fill up the vacant post of six members and a chairperson at the earliest so that cases related to child abuse can be taken up seriously," Kanoongo said.
The chairperson expressed his displeasure over the functioning of state's investigating agencies which haven't been updating the NCPCR about the former's investigation into the illegal trade of children by Christian missionaries.
"The investigating agencies are not cooperating with us for they have not paid heed to our repeated requests on sharing information regarding their investigation into the illegal sale and purchase of children," he said. He added, "There have been several raids on the premises of Missionaries of Charity across the state since July, 2018. However, they have always refused to share information with us in this regard and with the state body going defunct, we are not able to take up the issue properly."
On being asked about NCPCR's initiatives for curbing human trafficking, he said they are holding benches across all districts of the state to hear cases related to child rights. "Out of the 19 districts in Jharkhand, we have covered seven of them and have disposed of more than 2,500 cases related to child rights till now. As soon as the exam season is over, we will continue with our benches in the remaining districts," Kanoongo added.
Meanwhile, Kanoongo, after meeting Murmu, inaugurated a district resource center in Budhmu and distributed a book written by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to students where she advised them not to get stressed over examinations and instead should treat it like a festival.