Punjab witnesses sharp rise in number of child abuse cases

LAHORE: The number of child abuse cases is sharply increased in Punjab province during the last seven months as the figure stands at 126 as per statistics recorded by the provincial government, ARY News reported on Wednesday.

The Punjab government has witnessed alarming rise in the number of child abuse cases as 126 children were subjected to the crimes during the last seven months across the province.

According to the government statistics, 126 cases have been registered with the concerned departments and 129 persons were nominated in the cases.

The documents also stated that three children were brutally killed after rape by the culprits.

Following the poor investigation, most of the accused persons managed to get release orders on bail in child abuse cases.

The latest in the series of the gruesome incidents of child abuse, police had found remains of two children and a complete dead body of another kid in Punjab’s Chunian tehsil of Kasur district yesterday who were kidnapped months ago by unidentified culprits.

The recovery was made from Chunian by-pass, whereas, the local police officials had also confirmed that all three were brutally murdered after being sexually assaulted.

The deceased children had been identified as Salman, Muhammad Imran and Muhammad Faizan.

Police have launched a thorough investigation into the incident, while dead bodies have been sent for post-mortem.

Inspector General (IG) Punjab Police issued directives to the police forces to arrest the culprits behind the inhumane incident.

Earlier in January this year, the Senate’s special body had been informed that as many as 300 cases of child abuse and others were registered in the federal capital Islamabad during the last five years.

DIG Operations Islamabad, while apprising the Upper House’s special body, had said that due to unavailability of the lock-ups for the children, the number of child abuse cases can rise.

“At least 300 cases of child abuse were registered, while 260 cases remained unregistered in last five years,” the DIG operations said in his briefing.

Moving further, he said the two missing girls, who disappeared in 2016, could not be traced; while more than 1,400 children were recovered, who were begging in the federal capital.

The DIG operations in his briefing to the lawmakers highlighted the lack of coordination between the institutions about the exchange of information about missing children.

On the occasion, the secretary of the Ministry of Human Rights urged the need of building the Missing Children Bureau.