Source: Hueiyen News Service
Kolkata, June 01 2009:
A group of 25 children from Manipur, aged between six and 14 years, was rescued at Howrah station on Wednesday morning while being taken to Andhra Pradesh.
Three men who were accompanying the group told police that they were pastors and the children were being taken to an Andhra village, Tadetalligudam, where they would be admitted to a good school.
A Athiko, A Loli and Daniel Athiko were arrested after they failed to produce any document to back their claim.
"The children told us they had not eaten since June 15," said Jawed Shamim, the deputy commissioner of police (detective department).
After being rescued, the children were given food and sent to a home.
"During the raid on the train, our team couldn't find any document that showed the group was being taken for admission to schools.
It seems a big racket is at work.
We have handed over the probe to the CID," Shamim said.
The police action followed a tip-off from an NGO that works among children in Manipur and Nagaland.
The organisation had alerted the detective department of the city police about the group through an email.
"We had learnt that the team was coming by the Guwahati-Bangalore Superfast Express.
As soon as the train pulled into Howrah station early on Wednesday, a team comprising men from the detective department and GRP and a representative of a city-based NGO started searching the coaches," said an officer.
While the cops were speaking to the children through an interpreter they had hired, the three men escorting the group turned up.
"A probe revealed the children are from poor families in Kaibi, a small village in Manipur close to the Nagaland border.
The men posing as pastors told the families that the children would be better off if they were handed over to them," said an officer.
"We are yet to find out whether money had changed hands but obviously the racket has spread far and wide," the officer added.