Hyderabad: “My home is Platform No. 10,” says Raju, an 11-year-old whose childhood memories are predominantly of trains and coaches. Dressed in a soiled, white-and-yellow striped T-shirt and torn jeans, he walks barefoot with bruises on his body. Where other kids his age can reel off the alphabet, Raju can recite entire train announcements in English without a single pause.
He waves at porters and vendors at Secunderabad station. “I have been living here for the past five years. I keep hopping from train to train, collect empty water bottles and sell them to a scrap store outside the station at Rs 100 per sack. Once, I hit the owner because he refused to pay me,” he says with the pride of one forced to live by his wits.
His prized possession is a Rs 500 currency note, which he wants to spend on buying a ticket to watch a cricket match at LB Stadium. All that he remembers about his family are a couple of words in Kannada and that he belongs to Bengaluru.
“I think my mother lives somewhere near the Majestic bus stop. From what people tell me, I apparently got lost at the station and both of us got into different trains. I was roaming around for food and then landed up with a few others,” he said.
Raju has been picked up by the police around 11 times and sent to different rescue homes. But he managed to escape from all of them. “I don’t want to stay at these hostels, as they would hit me and abuse me and not let me sleep. I had a fight with one inmate at a Saidabad hostel. I hit him on the head with a plate and ran off,” he said, highlighting the shameful condition of places that are supposed to protect children.
Raju’s story is one of many that demonstrate the pathetic state of child security in the state. There are many children like him in the age group of 6-15 who are found hanging out near railway stations, tea stalls, bus stops. They have run away from home because of severe abuse or ill treatment from step parents. Sometimes, they are just left by the garbage dump.
Twenty such children live in Secunderabad Railway Station. Accompanying Raju is 12-year-old Kiran. A scar on his forehead and burn marks on his forearm, tell his story.
“My father was a drunkard and he would beat me often. My mother died in an accident two years ago at Mahbubnagar. I ran off from the hospital, got into a train and came here. I sell water packets sometimes or collect water bottles and earn enough money to eat daily,” said Kiran. His weekend hobby is watching a movies “I have watched all the movies in the last two years and I wish to meet actor Prabhas some day,” says Kiran.
Walking by the Rathil-file Bus Station you will see two brothers, Shiva, 10, and Srinivas, 8, performing dangerous stunts on the road dividers. The brothers have wounds all over their bodies.
They ran away from their home in Gandipet three years ago just for fun. “We saw a crowded bus and got into it. Since then we have been escaping from the police and from street educators who take us to the hostel. We have been living in the parking area of a hotel,” Shiva said.
