Police rescue 24 girls from care home, arrest four

NEW DELHI: India's top court yesterday ordered the government to explain what it was doing to prevent rape at state-run children's homes as horrific details emerge of sex abuse rings. Narendra Modi's political opponents also seized on the scandals at two government-run facilities, accusing the prime minister of keeping quiet about India's record of rape. Police are investigating the sexual assault of dozens of girls at the shelters in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh. The states are governed in coalition or outright by Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

The Supreme Court yesterday, hearing a plea into the Bihar case, admonished the Modi government's record in tackling rape. "Every six hours, a woman is raped in India," declared a three-judge bench in New Delhi. "What is to be done? Girls and women are getting raped left, right and center." The Delhi Commission for Women Monday announced a committee to audit all government shelters across the national capital.

Congress party leader Rahul Gandhi yesterday attacked Modi over the issue, saying the prime minister was vocal on all subjects "but not women". "Women are being raped in Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and so many other states but the prime minister is quiet," the main opposition leader told supporters in Delhi. India's treatment of women has attracted global scrutiny since the gang-rape and murder of a young student on a New Delhi bus in 2012 made international headlines.

Her brutal murder sparked nationwide protests and led to tougher sentences for perpetrators. But sex crimes remain rampant and activists say women are reluctant to come forward, meaning the real figure for rapes is much higher than recorded. Indians took to the streets in April in numbers not seen in years after details emerged of the rape and murder of a Muslim infant and the separate assault on a teenager by a BJP state lawmaker.

Police rescued 24 girls and shut down a care home that had been operating illegally in northern India after a youngster living there fled and complained to officers about sexual exploitation. They arrested four people on suspicion of trafficking and closed the home that has been operating in Deoria district in northern Uttar Pradesh, 325 km from the state capital Lucknow, police said after Monday's rescue.

This is the second instance of sexual abuse in homes for destitute children in less than a month after 29 girls were alleged to have been raped and tortured in Bihar state, sparking national outrage and demands for such homes to be investigated. Sexual and physical abuse are common in care homes, where many children are not orphans but placed in care by parents who are too poor to feed, clothe and shelter them, campaigners say.

"We have sealed the shelter home and arrested a couple who managed the shelter," said Ganesh Prasad Saha, a senior police official in Deoria. He did not give details about the other two arrested. A case of alleged trafficking and illegal adoption has been registered. Local media reports said 18 girls were missing from the Uttar Pradesh shelter home run by the couple, but Saha said the police could not confirm that.

Deoria district magistrate Amit Kishore confirmed the four arrests and said the authorities had previously revoked the shelter home's license, but it had remained open. Media reports said Uttar Pradesh's Women and Child Welfare Department revoked the license in June 2017 after detecting large-scale irregularities. India has about 7,300 care shelters, which are home to some 230,000 children, the National Commission for the Protection of Child Rights estimates. About 1,300 of them are unregistered, which means they operate illegally with little or no oversight. - Agencies