Tolni
14 March 2009, 05:17 AM
Delhi notebook - agony of missing children
The streets of the Badli Industrial Area in north Delhi are teeming with children.
This is the kind of place where migrant families settle, after coming to Delhi to look for work.
In a small courtyard on a side street Sangeeta Giri is washing her family's clothes. Her husband Harishankar, a driver, is sitting nearby.
It looks like a normal domestic scene, but there's something wrong. Their daughter Sunita went missing last June, two weeks after they arrived in the city.
Tears
They registered Sunita's disappearance with the police on the day she went missing. She's recorded as being 3ft 3in (1m) tall, wearing a pink top and shirt, with bare feet.
She's five-years-old.
Child in Delhi
Children from poorer families are more likely to disappear
Harishankar shows me the photo they have given to the police. But it's not a picture of Sunita - they don't have one - it's her sister at the same age.
The only image of Sunita is the one they carry in their heads.
In the tiny room where the family live Sangeeta rummages for all they have left... a few of her daughter's clothes.
Tears run down Sangeeta's face.
"We've looked everywhere for her," she sobs. "At bus stops, orphanages, hospitals. We've gone crazy trying to find her.
"We've even paid money to the police. We just don't know what to do."
At the local police station, the details of Sunita's case are hand-written in a book. "Pending investigation," it says.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7926263.stm
The streets of the Badli Industrial Area in north Delhi are teeming with children.
This is the kind of place where migrant families settle, after coming to Delhi to look for work.
In a small courtyard on a side street Sangeeta Giri is washing her family's clothes. Her husband Harishankar, a driver, is sitting nearby.
It looks like a normal domestic scene, but there's something wrong. Their daughter Sunita went missing last June, two weeks after they arrived in the city.
Tears
They registered Sunita's disappearance with the police on the day she went missing. She's recorded as being 3ft 3in (1m) tall, wearing a pink top and shirt, with bare feet.
She's five-years-old.
Child in Delhi
Children from poorer families are more likely to disappear
Harishankar shows me the photo they have given to the police. But it's not a picture of Sunita - they don't have one - it's her sister at the same age.
The only image of Sunita is the one they carry in their heads.
In the tiny room where the family live Sangeeta rummages for all they have left... a few of her daughter's clothes.
Tears run down Sangeeta's face.
"We've looked everywhere for her," she sobs. "At bus stops, orphanages, hospitals. We've gone crazy trying to find her.
"We've even paid money to the police. We just don't know what to do."
At the local police station, the details of Sunita's case are hand-written in a book. "Pending investigation," it says.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7926263.stm