AAP Rajya Sabha member raises concerns over cases of missing children, women

New Delhi, Dec 3 (PTI) Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) Rajya Sabha member Ashok Kumar Mittal on Wednesday raised concerns over the cases of missing children and women in the country, while advocating for a stringent law to check human trafficking.

Raising the issue during the Zero Hour in the upper house, Mittal said, according to National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data, 47,000 innocent children are missing or untraced in the country.

What is even more alarming, according to the NCRB data, is that approximately 1.97 lakh women are still missing, he said.

The AAP's Rajya Sabha member from Punjab said that these are the official figures, but the number of cases which do not reach the police station will be in lakhs.

He said the Supreme Court also recently said that in India, one child goes missing every eight minutes.

"The question is, what happens to these children, and where do these women go? The truth is that it's not just a case of missing people. This is a despicable conspiracy of organised human trafficking," Mittal said.

These kidnapped innocent children and women are forced into begging, prostitution, bonded labour, and even pushed into the hell of organ trade, he said, and offered three suggestions to stop this humanitarian crisis.

Mittal suggested that such disappearances should be considered as human trafficking cases, and demanded stringent legislation for human trafficking prevention and rehabilitation care from the government.

He also suggested the creation of a national missing person tracking portal under the Ministry of Home Affairs, and facial recognition-like modern technology is used in it, so that, if a child or a woman is missing, then they can be identified through this technology in any corner of the country.

Mittal also suggested a "column" should be introduced in the Census exercise to account for missing and untraced people. "If we don't count them, how will we find them?" he asked.

Besides him, MPs from different parties raised demands related to their respective states during the Zero Hour.

CPI's Sandosh Kumar P highlighted the issue of vacant posts in the country's colleges and universities.

"We have approximately 50,000 colleges and 1,000 universities in our country...Three lakh teaching posts are vacant in our universities and government colleges. Don't we have enough qualified teachers to fill up these vacancies?" he asked.

Sandosh, the CPI's Rajya Sabha member from Kerala, sought urgent steps to fill up these vacancies.

"We have thousands of qualified graduates with whom we can fill these vacancies," he said.

Sandosh said there are approximately 6.5 lakh teachers on a contract or ad-hoc basis. "They have no job security, no proper salary, no proper working conditions. This issue must be addressed," the CPI's Parliamentarian said.

BJP's Nabam Rebia from Arunachal Pradesh sought changes in the criteria meant for the construction of roads under the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY).

He said Arunachal Pradesh is the biggest state of the northeast from an area point of view, and its population is very small.

Under the PMGSY phase 4 guidelines, for the northeast, 250 plus population criteria has been set for qualifying.

"Arunachal still does not qualify. If we go for 250 plus habitation, only 84 habitation areas will be benefited or eligible. More than 500 villages will be left unconnected," Rebia said.

He said the population criteria for Arunachal Pradesh, under the PMGSY Phase 4, should be 100 plus.

"This should be the same for Arunachal Pradesh, as applicable to the left-wing extremism area," Rebia said.

DMK's Tiruchi Siva demanded that the term "Divyangjan" be replaced with "differently abled persons".

He said in 2014-15, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had, in a Mann Ki Baat radio programme, mentioned that the term Viklang, that is disabled, should be replaced with Divyang, which means persons with divine organs or powers.

This was aimed at creating a shift in the societal attitude towards this community and also to create a very good inclusive environment, said the party's Rajya Sabha member from Tamil Nadu.

He said a United Nations committee on disabled persons "has termed the term very much derogatory".

"The government of India has given an explanation that the translation is totally different and this is not (as such), and the people have accepted. Whereas, the rights group for the rights of the disabled person have also said that this only superficially elevates the social status of the people. So, I urge kindly change that to differently abled persons from the Divyangs or PWDs (that is Persons with Disabilities)," Siva said.

Shiv Sena-Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray party leader Priyanka Chaturvedi raised the issue of rising food adulteration across the nation.

"Right from contaminated cough syrups, that have been taking the lives of infants, that are being prescribed by doctors and low-quality medicines available freely in the market, as well as the food adulteration that leads to cancer across the country, need to be brought under control.

"And we need to have stricter measures and punitive action against those who are flouting these norms," Chaturvedi said. PTI AKV HVA