Girl who went missing from Delhi's Sanskar Ashram rescued from Sonagachi in Kolkata

A girl who went missing from Sanskar Ashram in Delhi last year has been rescued from the red light area of Sonagachi in Kolkata, police said Tuesday.

The girl went missing along with eight other female inmates of Sanskar Ashram in December last year. They were lodged there for rehabilitation after being rescued from the red light area of GB Road in Delhi in 2017, officials said.

Following a tip off, officials of the Anti-Human Trafficking Unit of Delhi Police's Crime Branch raided Sonagachi last Saturday and rescued the girl, Rajiv Ranjan, Additional Commissioner of Police (Crime), said.

The girl has been brought back to Delhi and is currently lodged at Nari Niketan for care and rehabilitation, he added.

Nine girls between the age of 17 to 22 years had run away from Sanskar Ashram in Dilshad Garden on the intervening night of December 1 and 2, the officer said.

Eight out of these nine girls are from Nepal, while the other one is from Bhagalpur in Bihar. These girls along with four others had been rescued from a brothel in Delhi's GB Road in November, 2017, he said.

Later, they were shifted to Sanskar Ashram in May last year after an order of the Child Welfare Committee, the officer said.

A reward of Rs 25,000 had also been declared by Delhi Police in the case.

Efforts are being made to trace the remaining girls at the earliest, police said, adding further investigation is underway.