I read the following news on msn. How professionals can do so! Shameful
Bangalore: More details have emerged on the torture of the 14-year-old domestic help in Bangalore, who was rescued from her employers in here. The incident was first reported in these columns on December 30, 2009.
The girl has told the police that she was asked to remove her clothes while at work. When she protested, she was beaten black and blue by the couple.
The girl's condition when rescued was so bad that she was directly moved to the ICU of Indira Gandhi Institute of Child Health (IGICH). Her employers had not just tortured her on daily basis, but also poured hot oil on her back.
On December 29, acting on the tip off, the Association for Promoting Social Action, raided the house of Pallab Chakraborty, a software engineer at Infosys and rescued the girl. Both Pallab and his wife Sanchita were arrested immediately.
The girl, who spoke after being treated at IGICH, left the child rights activists and the police speechless when she claimed that her employers forced her to move around the house near naked.
She also told the investigators that Pallab would molest her and ordered her to go about her chores wearing just a panty. It was only when the couple had visitors that the girl was given a long top to cover herself. The girl also said that there were times when she covered herself with a bathing towel.
The couple gave her just one meal a day and she was made to sleep on the floor without even a bed sheet to cover herself, she said.
The police who have already booked the couple under the Prohibition of Child Labour Act and Domestic
Violence Act, said that they would add Section 344 - Outraging the modesty of Women of the IPC to the charges against them.
Police added that the girl who used to live with her grandmother in West Bengal, was brought to Bangalore, 15 months ago. As the girl wanted to pursue her studies, the couple had brought her here by promising to send her to school.
The police said the girl's claims have been communicated to the Karnataka State Commission for Child Protection.
The Commission Chairperson Neena Naik has said that they were awaiting the medical reports before preparing a case against the couple.
Meanwhile, the Chakraborty couple who had been booked under wrongful confinement, threatening and child harassment have obtained a bail, has upset the child rights activists. More than 300 people held a protest in front of Pallab's residence in Bangalore and demanded the sacking of Pallab Chakraborty, the techie from Infosys, accused of torturing the domestic help.
The Bangalore chapter of Campaign Against Child Labour (CACL), a network of NGOs working againt child labour, has demanded that Infosys should sack the techie immediagtely. CACL also wants corporates to raise awareness among their emmployees on Child Rights Policy.
The NGOs also protested against the release of Pallab's wife Sanchita.
In another development, the Kolkata chapter of CACL is on a fact finding mission about the incident and would meet the maid who is reportedly an orphan. The organisation plans to rehabilitate her.
CAclubindia
