Team Herald
PANJIM: The High Court of Bombay at Goa has directed the State government to hold an inquiry and fix responsibility into the lapses in the Juvenile Justice Act.
The directions to the Chief Secretary were passed on Thursday during the hearing of a public interest litigation filed by a NGO working in the field of child welfare, about 9 years ago.
The State government had last month submitted to the court that around 2,615 children are lodged in 78 child care institutions registered under the JJA. Out of these, 512 were admitted without orders from the respective district child welfare committees while over 2000 children did not have a CWC order. The government has also been identifying children in need of care and protection for repatriating them in their respective home States. There was confusion over registration of children in need of care and protection.
In the last order, the court had highlighted the position, which is, far from desirable and it opened that the present pace of visits to institutions had to be improved. The bench has then directed the CWCs to visit the remaining institutions within one week.
