A committee constituted by the Bombay high court on Wednesday submitted a report highlighting the problems that arise in keeping mentally challenged children at shelter homes; and the court has asked
A committee constituted by the Bombay high court on Wednesday submitted a report highlighting the problems that arise in keeping mentally challenged children at shelter homes; and the court has asked the government of Maharashtra to file a reply on the report within two weeks.
The division bench of Justice V.M. Kanade and Justice Revati Mohite-Dere was hearing a suo motu PIL of the dilapidated condition of Children’s Observation Home at Umerkhadi in Dongri.
Sarita Krishnan, one of the committee members, informed the court that as per the report, the basic intention at the observation home is to unite the child with parents but the biggest problem is that the complete names of most of the children are not known, making it very difficult to trace their parents.
The report also said that though shelter, food and clothing is provided to these children, there is some lacunae in providing education because they are mentally challenged and there are very few experts available to counsel these children. The court was informed that there are psychiatrists but very few experts who are trained to counsel such children so this remains a challenge for officials.
The high court took on record the report of the committee headed by Asha Bajpayee of Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS) and asked the state government to file a reply within two weeks.
The court was informed that there are around 19 observation homes across the state that house around 1,100 such children.
As far as shelter home at Umerkhadi is concerned, the court noted that the number of children at the home had come down to 200 from 400 earlier by shifting inmates to other such institutions and said they were happy to learn that computer and carpentry training was being imparted to the children.
Meanwhile, the court also asked the state government to ensure that juveniles in shelter homes are imparted proper education and vocational training so that it becomes easy for them to socially integrate in the society at a later stage.
