SC take note of firing incident inside juvenile home in Bihar

The Supreme Court on Thursday took note of a recent incident in Bihar where five juveniles escaped from a remand home in Purnea after allegedly killing the caretaker and a fellow inmate, and wondered as to how guns came inside the institution.

"Newspaper reports about the Bihar incident says that gun shots were fired there. Where do all these guns come from?" a bench of justices Madan B Lokur and Deepak Gupta said.

Former senior police officer Amod Kanth, who is associated with an NGO working for child development, told the bench that Purnea incident was "very shocking" and the social audit conducted earlier by the Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS) had said that 17 such homes in Bihar were in miserable condition.

He said statutory authorities have to play a pro-active role to deal with the issue.

Meanwhile, advocate Aparna Bhat, assisting the apex court as an amicus curiae in the matter related to exploitation of children in orphanages, told the bench that she, along with joint secretary of Ministry of Women and Child Development, would review different reports on the issue and would come out with recommendations.

Bhat said that the ministry has received reports about condition of children homes running in all the states and the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights' (NCPCR) was also carrying out social audit of these homes.

"We can review all the reports and would then come out with recommendations," she told the bench.

The bench has posted the matter for hearing after four weeks.

The apex court had earlier termed the NCPCR's report on the status of children in shelter homes across India as "frightening".

It had noted that as per NCPCR report, out of the 2,874 children homes audited by them, only 54 have received positive reviews from the body set up under the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act.