By Syed Ali Mujtaba
During the testing process for the Covid 19 in a state-run children’s shelter home in Kanpur UP, 57 girls have tested positive. Among them five minor girls were found to be pregnant and of them five tested positive and two negative for the virus, an official has reportedly said.
The shelter home, located at Swaroop Nagar Kanpur, has been sealed by the district administration and the staff has been quarantined.
According to Kanpur DM Brahma Dev Ram Tiwari; “The seven girls were pregnant at the time when they came to the shelter home. Two girls are undergoing treatment at LLR Hospital in Kanpur, while three are undergoing treatment at private hospital,” the DM said.
The five pregnant girls are from Agra, Etah, Kannauj, Firozabad and Kanpur. They were referred to children’s shelter homes by the Child Welfare Committees of these districts. The POCSO Act is going on in all these cases.
Kanpur’s Senior Superintendent of Police Dinesh Kumar P. said; “many are spreading rumors that these girls got pregnant while at the shelter home, which absolutely isn’t true. This is not a case akin to Muzaffarpur,” he said.
UP Women’s Commission member Poonam Kapoor told the media; “No males are allowed to enter the shelter. Such matters shouldn’t be twisted — the girls were already pregnant.” she said.
Reacting to the media reports, Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi alleged that the government was suppressing facts.
Taking up the issue of the girls being found pregnant she said; “the entire story of the Muzaffarpur shelter home case is in front of the country. Such a case had also come to light in Deoria in UP. Now such inhuman incidents are again taking place which shows the ugly face of the BJP government in UP,” Priyanka Gandhi said.
In this scenario, such an incident again coming out shows that everything is suppressed in the name of investigations, but very inhuman incidents are taking place in government child protection homes, she said.