103 children in a year: Rescues from railway stations on the rise in Ernakulam district

KOCHI: After a brief lull, the number of children being rescued by the Railway Childline in the district is rapidly increasing. As per the data available, during the two years when restrictions were in place due to COVID, the number of children going truant had declined. However, it can be seen that right after the restrictions got lifted, the numbers jumped up.

In the financial year 2021-2022, childline rescued 103 children below the age of 14. In the past two months, 35 children were rescued from different railway stations in the district.  "In the last five days, we rescued nine children from Aluva railway station. Among them, eight were below the age of 14 and one was 16-years old," said Amrutha Sivan, coordinator, Railway Childline. 

According to her, half of the children being rescued hail from the northern states. "However, the other 50 per cent are from Kerala. These kids are very vulnerable. They get easily manipulated and often end up doing jobs at dangerous places including construction sites at very low pay," the official added. Children from the northern states reach Kerala mostly in search of jobs.

It is very tough to trace their families, she added. "These children are trained in such a way that they refuse to divulge details like the phone number or address of their parents. The only thing they repeat is the name of the place from where they have arrived. In such cases, we are forced to accommodate them in shelters where they are gradually cajoled into providing the information," said the coordinator.

She said, "Once the details are received, we inform the Child Welfare Committee of the state from where the child hails from and hand over the kids to them. From then on it’s the CWC's responsibility."

However, it is a different situation with children who are from within the state. According to her, many cases are associated with porn and game addictions.

"They get involved with groups during gaming or while watching porn. When these so-called friends in the groups contact them and ask them over, these kids abscond from their homes. They tell their parents that they are going over to their friend's place. But in reality, they catch the train and travel to the next district or even outside the state. This is a dangerous situation," she said.