TOI: State considers privatising kids’ remand homes: July 16, 2010

Mumbai: In a shocking move, the state-government funded Children’s Aid Society (CAS) is considering privatising the seven remand homes — spread out over around 100 acres of land — that it runs for children in conflict with the law, destitute and runaways.

   The governing council members of the Children’s Aid Society received a letter from the Society’s chief officer on the agenda for the forthcoming annual general meeting, which mentions plans to parcel off the seven Children’s Homes to NGOs. A copy of this document is with TOI.

   Governing council members point to the fact that the Children’s Aid Society is itself a charitable organisation set up 80 years ago during the British Raj to administer the Children’s Homes. While it is funded by the government, it functions as an autonomous body with its own constitution. “It is absolutely unconstitutional to even consider distributing these homes amongst NGOs. The government has absolutely no authority to do so,’’ said Sharad Dave, a member of the governing council.

   “The Children’s Aid Society is already an NGO, so how can it be parcelled off to other NGOs,’’ asks Aruna Acharya, another members of the governing council.

   When TOI contacted H B Rathod, chief officer of the Children’s Aid Society, he said that the agenda for the meeting was set by the president and vice-president of the Society, posts occupied by the home minister and the minister for woman and child, respectively.

   Both governing council members as well as officials at the remand homes say that the government wants to sell off remand homes to NGOs, especially since they sit on 100-odd acres of prime property in Mumbai.

   This isn’t the first time that the government has had its eye on the land on which the remand homes are located. “In 1998, a minister from the government of Maharashtra visited the Children’s Homes in Mankhurd, which were in a bad state. He proposed shifting the kids to a makeshift home, getting a builder to make a brand-new set of cottages for the kids, and parcelling off the rest of the land to the builder. I put my foot down and refused to allow this to happen,’’ said a senior governing council member.

   While many of the Children’s Homes are in a pathetic condition, people involved with their functioning insist that privatisation is not the answer. “The Children’s Homes are in a mess because the government has consistently appointed politicians and political nominees in key posts of the Children’s Aid Society, who have throttled the CAS and prevented the governing council from functioning. The solution to the problem lies not in parcelling of the Homes to NGOs, but in allowing the governing council of the CAS to function,’’ said Acharya. Incidentally, the upcoming annual general meeting of the governing council is being held after an interval of nearly five years.

* CHANGE OF GUARDIANS? There are plans to parcel off seven Children’s Homes to NGOs