New Delhi, May 23:
In a significant move to combat child trafficking and missing children cases, the Supreme Court of India has directed police across the country to immediately register FIRs in all cases involving missing children without conducting any preliminary inquiry.
A Bench comprising Justices Ahsanuddin Amanullah and R. Mahadevan expressed serious concern over the growing gap between the number of children reported missing and those eventually traced, terming the issue “massive” and alarming.
The apex court ordered that FIRs must be registered promptly upon receiving information about a missing child and should include relevant provisions related to kidnapping and abduction under the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS). The Court clarified that guardians or parents should not be forced to wait for procedural formalities before police action begins.
The Court further directed that once investigators suspect trafficking, the case must immediately be transferred to specialized anti-human trafficking units without waiting for the standard four-month period.
In another major direction, the Bench asked the Ministry of Home Affairs to establish an all-India police grid and a dedicated national portal for tracking cases related to missing children, missing women, and human trafficking.
The observations came while hearing a case related to a minor girl who went missing from Chennai in 2011 and remains untraced despite investigations by multiple agencies. The matter had eventually reached the Supreme Court after the Madras High Court declined to interfere with the closure report filed by police.(KNC)