The National Commission for Protection of Child Rights has said in an affidavit filed in the Supreme Court that from April to June 5 this year, more than 3,000 children have been orphaned, and more than 26,000 children have lost their parents. April-May was a time when the second wave of coronavirus pandemic was wreaking havoc in the country.
However, the commission clarified that the deaths of parents of all children are not related to Corona.
More than 30,000 children in need of care – Commission
The commission said that 3,261 children had been orphaned across the country during the last two months. One of the parents of 26,176 has died, and their parents have abandoned 274 children.
The commission reported that 30,071 children need care and protection, of which 15,620 are boys, 14,447 are girls, and four are transgender people.
Of these, 11,815 are in the age group of 8-13, and 5,107 are in the age group of 4-7.
Supreme Court took suo moto cognisance of the matter.
After the Supreme Court order, all the states and union territories have shared these figures on the Bal Swaraj portal of the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights.
Significantly, on May 28, the Supreme Court took suo moto cognisance of the children orphaned due to the Corona crisis.
During that time, the court had ordered the states to complete the basic facilities of the children orphaned by Corona and register the information on the portal.
Most children in Maharashtra need care.
If we look at the state-wise figures, Maharashtra has the highest number of children at 7,084, Uttar Pradesh has 3,172, Rajasthan has 2,482, and Haryana has 2,438 children in need of care and protection. Apart from these, the number of such children in Madhya Pradesh and Kerala is more than 2,000.
The Supreme Court had strongly reprimanded Delhi and West Bengal for not giving the figures. This is the second affidavit filed by the commission in this regard in the Supreme Court.
The commission made these suggestions for the safety of children.
Earlier, the commission, in its affidavit, had suggested benefits of various schemes, including keeping them with one parent and necessary financial assistance from the government for children who lost one of the parents in the pandemic.
Apart from this, while suggesting that the children’s school education should not be affected, the commission said that the district education officers and the state governments would have to take appropriate steps for this.
The Center made many announcements for such children.
The commission said in the affidavit that the central government had made several important announcements from the PM Cares Fund to provide support to the affected children. The government has decided to run the ‘PM-Cares for Children’ scheme for the orphaned children.
The monthly stipend will be given to the orphan children at the age of 18 and Rs 10 lakh from PM Cares at the age of 23. Similarly, many announcements were made for his education as well.
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