New Delhi:
If a newborn goes missing from the hospital, the first step should be to cancel the hospital’s licence, the Supreme Court said today as it expressed anguish over cases of child trafficking and issued guidelines to tackle this menace.
The bench of Justice JB Pardiwala and Justice R Mahadevan was hearing a petition challenging bail to the accused in a child trafficking case. Pulling up the Allahabad High Court, the bench said the bail applications were “callously” dealt with and many accused are missing now. “These accused pose a serious threat to society. The least required of the high court while granting bail was to impose a condition to mark attendance at a police station every week. This police lost track of all the accused persons,” it said.
Justice Pardiwala said the bench was “thoroughly disappointed” with how the Uttar Pradesh government handled the matter. “…no appeal was made… no seriousness was shown… It appears the accused was longing for a son and then got a son for 4 lakh rupees. If you desire a son, you cannot go for a trafficked child. He knew the baby was stolen,” he said.
The court asked all the accused to surrender and said they must be sent to judicial custody. “Charges shall be framed within one week. If it’s informed that some accused have absconded, the trial court to issue non-bailable warrants. Trial of those present shall go on and not be delayed,” the court said.
Justice Pardiwala said the judgment contains detailed recommendations on tackling child trafficking and asked state governments to implement them at the earliest. “High Courts across the country are directed to call for the status of pending trials in child trafficking cases… Any laxity shown in implementing the directions would be taken seriously and be treated as contempt,” the court said.
Justice Pardiwala said parents must be vigilant about their children. “The pain and agony a parent faces when a child dies is different from when a child is lost to gangs of trafficking… when the child dies, the child is with the Almighty, but when lost, they are at the mercy of such gangs,” he said.
He then said that any hospital from where a newborn goes missing must lose its licence. “If any newborn is trafficked from a hospital..the first step should be to suspend the license of such hospitals. If any lady comes to deliver a child to the hospital and the baby is stolen, the first step is suspension of the licence,” Justice Pardiwala said.
India reports around 2,000 cases of child trafficking every year. According to the National Crime Records Bureau report, 2250 such cases were reported in 2022. Out of these, most cases were reported in Telangana, Maharashtra and Bihar.
