3,000 children missing from Punjab, Haryana

Chandigarh Even as the national capital continues to top the list of places with the highest number of missing children — statistics show that five minors disappear every day from Delhi — the neighbouring Punjab and Haryana too fare poorly.
Haryana leads the list of five north India states — others being Punjab, Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh and Uttrakhand — with 1,608 children reported missing. According to the statistics, the most number of missing boys and girls in Haryana are between the age group of 12 to 18. The state is closely followed by Punjab with 1,393 missing children.
Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir and Uttrakhand have 317, 284 and 206 cases of missing children respectively.
These figures were revealed by senior officers from the respective states during a workshop on advisory on missing children at Central Detective Training School in Chandigarh. The workshop was organized by the Bureau of Police Research and Development (BPRD) of Union Home Ministry.
The Inspector General of Police, BPRD, Nirmal Chaudhary said that the Centre was concerned about the missing children.
“The ministry of Home Affairs is particularly concerned about the physical security and safety of the missing children. To understand the problem at the grass root level, we are holding workshops where the officers would tell as to what needs to be done about the handling the cases of the missing children,” Chaudhary said.
Saying that the situation is grim, especially in Haryana and Punjab, would be an understatement.
Giving a break-up, the officers said that in Punjab, the highest number of missing male children are from Ludhiana district. The police district, Ludhiana (city), has 347 missing male children followed by 115 from Jalandhar police district. Batala is the only district in Punjab from where no male child has been reported missing. Also, from 2005 onwards, 374 girl children have been reported missing in Punjab.
In Himachal Pradesh 169 male children and 148 girls are missing. However, the police claimed that the missing children cases can't be attributed to child trafficking.
“There is no organized gang of child trafficking in Himachal,” said IG, CID, Shimla, Prithvi Raj.
In the conflict hit Jammu and Kashmir, 161 boys and 123 girl children have been reported missing since 2007. In Uttrakhand , a total of 206 children are missing.

source