Child Sexual Abuse In Shelter Homes: The Horrible Truth!

If there is something that is deeply traumatizing and hurting, something that is unpardonable and indigestible, then the first in the list comes Child Abuse. And when this abuse is sexual, the repercussions have to be extreme and the guilty should undoubtedly be hanged.

The inside story of Child Sexual abuse
The number of child care homes and institutions is on the rise, and so are the cases of sexual abuse. And what is more pathetic is, the cases that haven’t come into the limelight largely outnumber the ones that have come under the police scanner. According to the Union Ministry of Women and Child Development, there are over 640 shelter homes across the country (child care centres and institutions) registered under the Juvenile Justice Act 2000. And over 30,000 children live in such homes. But when it comes to the number of homes unregistered under the act, the data and information is null.

There are two such shelters that had come under the media eye. One, a shelter home named ‘Apna Ghar’ in Rohtak, Haryana. One of the many mind-stagnating things happening here is that the ‘caretakers’ used to put the colours of Holi on the private parts of the children. In the case of Apna Ghar, three inmates escaped to narrate their horror stories. And other one, is the Arya Orphanage in Delhi. The medical examination of a 11 year old girl who died here confirmed rape.

Child abuse facts : Now let’s take a brief look at what actually is happening in most of the CCIs (Child Care Institutions).

The girl children are forced to strip off their clothes. There was forced abortion happening by inserting objects in their private parts. Every inmate, irrespective of their age and gender, were forced to consume liquor every night. The kids are forced to watch porn and the so called ‘caretakers’ use foul language at them.

This is just the brief, which itself is sickening. The activities and atrocities that haven’t come under the scanner are many more, and what is even more painful is the fact that a few cops are also involved in this abuse and torture towards children.

How the inside incidents spill out
The public comes to know of all such incidents only when an insider manages an ingenious escape and reports to someone, or when a rare and exceptional event exposes the sex tyrants. It has come out through many experts that for every reported case of sexual assault in a CCI, there are ten unreported cases.

The JJ Act, 2000, demands regular inspections by the inspection committee, monthly meetings of the management committees and quarterly inspections by the Child Welfare Committee members. When a child care home is not registered under the JJ Act, it gets the chance of escaping all this scrutiny. There are cases when the members of the inspection committee are bribed by the caretakers of Child Care Institution`s upon accidental exposure of the inside activities, and the result is the innocent children losing their very chance of freedom from the hellholes of sexual abuse.

Some appalling facts on Child sexual abuse in India

A huge number of children in our country go missing every year. Some are kidnapped, some are sold by their families in return for money, and some are lured for the promise of a better life. The following are the statistics provided by NGO CRY (Child Rights and You)

• About 9,000 children go missing in India every year.
• Over 5 lakh children are forcefully pushed into sex trade every year.
• Approximately 2 million commercial sex workers are between the ages of 5 and 15 years, and over 3.3 million are between the ages of 15 and 18.
• 40 percent of the children’s population in our country is into commercial sex working; and 80 percent of these children are found in the five metros – Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Bangalore and Chennai.
•  71 percent of these children are illiterate, that is, they are not aware of what is being done to them.

We got to think
Today’s children are the products of tomorrow’s India, but when the lives of these children are sailing on the waters of sexual abuse, we can anticipate our nation walking towards darkness. The children who have escaped from these homes of horror had put it that their lives had been extremely painful and agonizing, not just mentally but also physically. In most cases, they don’t have a chance to even interact with the staff of the CCIs. They are beaten badly in the name of inculcating discipline, insulted and molested, abused verbally, physically and sexually. Young girls are gang-raped in such homes, again and again; they are tormented and tortured to an extent where they heart-fully feel death is a better option.

Child sexual abuse prevention
Our government had produced a bill (Prevention of Sexual Offences Against Children) in 2011, but there have also been reports stating that the present legislation is not sufficient to curb child sexual abuse. We do not know how far the government is serious regarding this issue. We do not know if the government, in the first place, has bothered to think about this matter. All we got to know is, we just can’t rely or wait for our government. To make things change, we got to move.