Bhubaneswar: As many as 82 missing children, including 21 girls, have been rescued from outside the state under Operation Paree-III jointly launched by Odisha Police and Women and Child Development (W&CD) department in July this year.
The authorities have sent eight teams from both police and W&CD departments to trace these children trafficked outside.
The teams rescued around 20 children from Andhra Pradesh, 15 from Tamil Nadu, five from Maharashtra and four from Telangana.
Another team rescued 17 children from West Bengal, eight from Chhattisgarh, nine from Jharkhand and four from New Delhi.
These children were rescued from railway stations and bus stands from various localities of these states. Many children, who were staying at the Child Care Institutions (CCIs) and shelter homes under the Child Welfare Committees (CWCs) in various states, were also rescued by the teams.
The rescued children have been kept at the CCIs in Capital after presenting them before the CWC, Bhubaneswar. The authorities have been making contacts with their relatives and will later hand over the children to the family members.
As per the information available, the number of children went missing in 2016 was 1,792 including 1,291 girls which rose to 1,851 in 2017. The number of girls missing in the same period too spiked to 1,360.
Similarly, the state witnessed further rise in number of missing children in 2018. It reached 2,334 including 1,875 girls in 2018. In the first three months of 2019, 602 children including 502 have gone missing. However, the police performed dismally in tracing out such children. Out of 502 girls trafficked in the first quarter of the current year, police rescued only 79 girls.
