THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The Social Justice Department will have no choice but to play guardian to substantial chunk of sexual abuse victims now lodged in its Nirbhaya homes across the state. At least 60 percent of the 250-odd sexual abuse victims lodged in the eight Nirbhaya homes in the state, a large chunk of them below 18 years old, cannot be sent back to their homes. A documentation process conducted by the Department has found that these girls were abused either by their fathers or a sibling, and in some cases it was revealed that the mothers had pushed them into sex trade. At least three victims were impregnated by their own fathers.
Many of these families are now demanding their children back but the department has put its foot down. “We have put a proposal to the government to provide these girls with a house under the ‘housing mission’ announced by the Chief Minister recently,” a top social justice official said. The documentation has also thrown up another alarming fact: Nearly 80 percent of the victims are what has been termed “second-generation victims”, meaning daughters of mothers who had experienced some sort of abuse in their childhood. “These mothers just don't know how to handle the suffering of their child. Like the victim, such mothers too slip into depression,” the official said.
The documentation process involved a thorough background check of the victim’s family, the financial and emotional condition of her family members, and her life before the abuse. The 'probe into the past' is done a couple of days after a victim is brought to the Nirbhaya home. The re-integration of victims back into the society is complicated. The background checks have also revealed a shocking absence of local support mechanism.
