Today we are telling you the story of a traumatized mother Neelam Singh whose 14 year old daughter Payal was raped and later died in the hospital by the person whom her mother thought would help her and make her better as she was continuously ill for past many months.
This is Payal who lived in Kalyanpuri Delhi East slums who had zero appetite, had series of epilepsy and was growing weaker day by day was taken to a tantric who her mother thought could end her cult and get rid of evil spirits within her. The tantric on the pretext of curing her by some ritual asked her mother to leave her alone with him at midnight to which she agreed. Later the mother of the girl heard desperate screams of the girl to which the neighbor who had taken mother daughter duo to tantric stopped her from going inside.
After that day Payal who had epilepsy but was controlled for over three years developed uncontrolled seizures had to be admitted to mental hospital where she died six months later. The tantric who is now out on bail is back to his slums and continued the previous work and searching for more daughters like her to be targeted.
“The incident left her traumatized,” says Singh, who is fighting tirelessly with Kavita Kumar a social worker in one of Delhi’s 19 special courts, also called POCSO courts, designated for cases of children who are victims of sexual offences. Around 90,000 families are seeking justice for their children in these POCSO courts. The crime data, including sexual violence against children, has not been made public by the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) after 2016.
This year 24,212 have been reported as filed by first information reports (FIRs) in POCSO cases across India. Charge sheet has been filed only in 12,231 cases, and in 11,981 police investigation is still on. Trial had started only in 7,360 cases, of which the trial courts decided only 911, that is, around four per cent of the total cases registered. Trial is yet to begin in the remaining 4,871 cases.
If as on society we are not able to protect our daughters from evil then how we expect that our daughters to live a healthy life in which they would feel secured. We the biggest nation in the world still have so many pending cases left with and culprits are left loose inviting more of aggravated sexual offence. Child pornography even in boys is termed as crime. The recent amendments adds to the comprehensiveness of the law and even if laws are being amended to restore faith among the society. Judiciary still has to do a lot so that culprits like tantric and girls like Payal are given Justice.
There's a saying that Justice delayed is justice denied. Let we as nation don't deny justice.
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