Open shelters sought for rescued children in new districts

VIJAYAWADA: Krishna District Child Welfare Committee (CWC) former chairman B.V.S. Kumar has sought that the state government open shelters for rescued children in all the newly formed districts of Andhra Pradesh.

Kumar explained that police, staff of women and child welfare, NGOs and childline rescue children who have run away from their homes and arrived in various cities and towns. Such children are produced before the Child Welfare Committees of various districts. They are then accommodated in licensed open shelters till their parents are traced or they are repatriated to their native districts or states with police escort.

The former CWC chairman said the Andhra Pradesh government had established child welfare committees (CWCs) in all erstwhile 13 districts of the state. Now that the number of districts has risen to 26, the need has arisen to form these constitutional bodies in another 13 new districts.

Accordingly, he said, the state government has issued an order dated April 12, 2023, to set up new CWCs, juvenile justice boards (JJBs) and district child protection units (DCPUS) in all 13 new districts.

Kumar underlined that open shelters for boys and girls should be opened in all new district headquarters forthwith. Otherwise, it will be difficult for DCPUs or police to accommodate the rescued children in a safe place till they are reunited with their parents or rehabilitated in some other childcare institutions.

In this context, he pointed out that most of the new districts like Anakapalle, Bapatla, Paderu and Konaseema do not have any licensed open shelters.