Dhenkanal shelter home case: Pradhan seeks Rajnath's intervention for probe

Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan on Saturday wrote to Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh in order to ensure a fair and transparent probe in the Dhenkanal shelter home case.

The Dhenkanal Police has already sealed a shelter home run by a Non-Governmental Organisation (NGO) in view of the sexual harassment allegations levelled by inmates.

Some minor inmates of the shelter home accused the officials of sexual harassment, following which district Child Welfare Committee (CWC) officers and Child Protection Officer (CPO) raided the shelter home and later filed a complaint at Sadar Police station.

Dhenkanal's Sadar Police arrested the Project Director, Assistant Director and Managing Director of the shelter home in connection with the case.

Meanwhile, the inmates of the shelter home have been shifted to a nearby childcare centre.

A fact-finding team of Odisha Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) led by the president of the Mahila Morcha, Prabhati Parida, also visited the shelter home to meet the inmates and locals. However, the concerned shelter home was sealed and the inmates were shifted to some other place before their arrival.

Meanwhile, Union Minister for Women And Child Development Maneka Gandhi has written to Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik expressing grief over the incident.

"I am profusely aggrieved by news coming in from Dhenkanal about the state of affairs at the Good News India shelter home for children. It is alleged that the shelter home was rife with incidents of sexual harassment and was being used as a front for illegal religious conversion. Investigations have revealed that the 'Good News India' organisation running these homes has been operating in Odisha for the past two years without registration under Juvenile Justice Care and Protection of Children Act, 2015,"she wrote.

Gandhi also hit out at the state government for letting the incident occur. "This incident is revealing of a deep and utter failure on the part of the state government in taking basic precautionary measures for the safety and welfare of children, leading to such a heinous incident," she said.