KARACHI, March 31: Representatives of various NGOs working for the welfare of missing children have called for enhanced cooperation among all stake-holders to intensify efforts for the rehabilitation of such children. They urged the government to tackle the issues of poverty, unemployment and illiteracy which appeared to be the main reasons forcing children to flee their homes.

Speaking at a seminar on The Grim Problem of Missing Children organized by the Pakistan Press Foundation (PPF) at its Vicky Zeitlin Media Library here on Thursday, they observed that media had very important role to play in locating the missing children or finding parents of those found.

The speakers also called for more pragmatic approach to be adopted by the government and a more active role to be played by law-enforcement agencies in rehabilitating the missing and street-living children.

Ms Arfa Zainab of the Azad Foundation said that her organization worked for the rehabilitation of street-children for whom it had established day-care shelters. She said the children were being provided facilities of bathing, clothing, dining and non-formal education facilities at such centres.

According to her, there were more than 12,000 children aged between 10 and 12 years living in streets. Over 95 per cent of them are addict using different kinds of drugs, she said.

She told that as per their findings, poverty, violence, parents behaviour and several other reasons compel children to flee their homes and start living in streets.

Mr Mohammad Ali of LHRLA said that the Madadgaar helpline of his organization worked in collaboration with other NGOs, agencies and police for locating missing children. Moreover, he added, all such reported cases were compiled to maintain a record that could help policy makers chalk out some welfare plan.

According to him, a lost child would badly disturb his whole family. Highlighting the grievances of the family as well as the child, he criticized police for not taking such cases seriously.

He urged media to play its due role in ensuring reunion of such families.

He observed that in many cases, parents would miss their children while being at a crowded places, like markets, recreational, spots etc., where some 800-1000 children were reported lost annually.

Mr Nasim Ahmed Khan of the Edhi Foundation said his organization had been maintaining several facilities where the children found after leaving their homes, and also those brought by police or NGOs, were accommodated. They are kept at these centres until their parents or relatives are located. During their stay, they are imparted training of how to earn their livelihood.

Mr Khan lauded the services of media, especially Radio Pakistan, in locating missing children or parents, and stressed on more efforts in this regard.

“Last year, the Edhi Foundation located parents of 400 missing children. This may not have been possible without the help of media,” he said.

He stated that majority of missing children came from Punjab, and attributed the children’s going missing or leaving their homes to poverty, illiteracy unemployment, etc.

He called for the establishment of more shelters for such children and urged the government to take initiatives in this regard because NGOs could not make it due to their limited resources.

Mushtaq Ahmed of the Overseas Pakistanis Foundation spoke of child trafficking with reference to camel racing in Gulf countries.

He suggested that NGOs should distribute the responsibilities with respect to rehabilitation of missing children.

He observed that there were some organized gangs indulged in the abduction of children who would later be forced into the profession of begging or smuggled out to some Gulf state to become camel jockeys, known as ‘camel-kids’.

He noted that almost all the camel-kids belonged to the Seraiki belt, and in most cases, parents would agree to send their male children to earn a handsome amount every month to overcome the problems related to their poverty.—PPI