Child rescuing schemes come a cropper in Tamil Nadu

The Centre asked the states to take up a one-month campaign titled ‘Operation Smile’ in January, 2015, to rescue or rehabilitate the missing children. Similarly, ‘Operation Muskaan’ was launched in July 2015 throughout the country. 

“The Department of Social Defence is not effectively implementing such programmes in the state. As per the guidelines, the officials should conduct intensive searches. But they are simply rescuing children working as child labourers and falsely classify them as victims of trafficking,” said a source. Had the officials meticulously implemented the programmes, no child would have gone missing and, in fact, more children would have been rescued in the state, the source added. 

A Narayanan, child rights activist and director, Change India, says: “Lack of coordination leads to the failure of such programmes. There should be a proper monthly review meeting of top police and DSD officials so that pending cases are reviewed and attempts made to solve them. And, Operation Muskaan and Operation Smile programmes are a complete failure in Tamil Nadu,”. 

When contacted, Raj Saravanan, Joint Director, DSD, Chennai, said they were aware of the NHRC notice. However, he evaded questions on the next course of action.

Under Operation Smile and Muskaan, all children residing in shelter homes, platforms, bus stands, roads, religious places, etc., are to be screened by trained police personnel. The personnel would tactfully elicit information from such children without any intimidation. To know the full magnitude of the problem, data with full details of the number of cases of missing children will be maintained and shared at intra-state and inter-state level.