NHRC concerned about increasing crime against children

Gulbarga, Mar 11 (UNI) Expressing concern over the increasing criminal acts against children, National Human Rights Commission acting Chairman Justice Shivaraj Patil today said guidelines would be framed to check it.

Addressing a press conference here, he said a five-member committee, headed by former CBI Director P C Sharma, would be constituted to probe into the violations of rights of children.

He said a suo motu notice has been issued to the Uttar Pradesh Government, asking it to brief about the investigation into the serial killings of children in Nithari and why only 19 cases were registered when 38 children had gone missing.

Justice Patil said the NHRC had taken cognisance of custodial deaths and was taking all steps to punish the guilty. Citing an example, he said an ACP in Delhi was sentenced to life for custodial death recently. With regard to 'fake encounters', the NHRC was framing some guidelines to bring culprits to the book, which included videographing of post mortem.

Reeling out statistics, he said Uttar Pradesh has the dubious distinction of recording the highest number of human rights violation cases, followed by Bihar, Delhi and Haryana.

''The NHRC is holding seminars, workshops and other awareness programmes to sensitise the people on human rights. It will soon bring out a booklet, titled 'Know Your Rights', in all Indian languages. In fact, human rights should be part of the school curriculum,'' he said.

The NHRC chief said the commission would hold a three-day review meeting in Bihar from April 19 to 21 to review human rights violations. The body receives about 75,000 human rights violation complaints evey year.

''Henceforth, the NHRC will make surprise visits to prisons, hospitals, police stations and other places where human rights violation generally occur. It is empowered under a new act to make such visits without prior intimation,'' he informed.

Justice Patil said the Supreme Court has directed the NHRC to look into the conditions in Ranchi, Agra and Gwalior mental hospitals as a public interest litigation is filed against the maintenance of the hospital and human rights violations taking place there.

Describing the recent Surpur police torture in the district in which police burnt the genitals of a man, as ''inhuman'', he regretted that the Superintendent of Police did not apprise him about the incident while he was in the city. ''If necessary, I will discuss it with the DGP or Chief Secretary,'' he added.

UNI