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Lucknow, August 6
The Deoria police have rescued 24 minor girls from an unlicensed shelter home following charges that they were being sexually exploited. There is still no trace of another 18 girls. “In all, 42 girls were on the rolls,” Deoria SP Rohan P Kanay said.
While Girija Tripathi, the manager of Ma Vindhyavasini Sanrakshan Grih, and her husband Mohan have been arrested, a search is on for their daughter Kanchan Lata. The licence of the shelter home had been revoked after a CBI probe on June 23, 2017, it is learnt.
The scandal, days after the Bihar’s Muzaffarpur sex scam, came to light when a 10-year-old inmate escaped on Sunday evening, reached the Mahila police station and narrated horrifying details.
Orphaned, the girl had been left there by her grandparents. She alleged that while minor girls were treated as bonded slaves, those in their teens were “picked up by luxury cars”, parked at the rear of the home, at 4 pm every day and brought back in the morning.
She claimed they were taken to Gorakhpur, accompanied by manager Tripathi. “On their return, the didis cry inconsolably,” she is reported to have told the police.
Acting promptly, the state government removed the District Magistrate and ordered a probe. Even as CM Adityanath Yogi asked all DMs to inspect shelter homes in their areas and submit a report within 12 hours, the Congress and the Samajwadi Party demanded a CBI probe. — TNS
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