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Missing child united with parents

Missing child united with parents

Last updated on: September 09, 2010 14:00 IST


Seven-year-old Mohammed Fazlu's life abruptly went off the rails when he stumbled into a train compartment in April in search of his missing ball.

Over four months later, when everyone had given up hope, he was restored to his family.

There will possibly never be a happier Eid for this child.

Abhishek Mande follows the trail.
On the afternoon of September 8, Ruby Nakka walked into the government reception home in Vellore run by Tamil Nadu's child welfare department to inquire about Mohammed Fazlu, who had been living there for over four months now.

Sometime in April, Fazlu, while playing football near the railway tracks, kicked the ball into a train compartment. As he stepped into the compartment to fetch it, the train began to move.

The terrified little boy -- he is only 7 -- stayed on the train.

On April 29, Railway Police Force constables picked him up at the Jolarpettai railway station in Tamil Nadu over 1,300 km from Mumbai [ Images ], which the child was is his home.

Unfortunately, the only two other things that Fazlu could recall of his whereabouts is a locality he calls Laksha Mohalla and a restaurant near his house called Mindha.

Fazlu could speak and understand Kannada and remembers the names of his family members -- father Ghouse Basha, a car mechanic, his mother Dilshad, a housewife, brothers Shakoor and Roshan and sisters Salma, Zaiba and Jamila, who he recalled being married to a certain Hafiz.

Till the morning of September 8, Ruby Nakka, a member of the local Child Welfare Committee, was quite sure that the boy was from Mumbai. He had spoken with his contact at the Mumbai CWC and was told that locating Laksha Mohalla in Mumbai was like trying to find a needle in a haystack.

Later that morning he received a call from Lava Kumar, a retired police officer from Bengaluru [ Images ], who told him that perhaps he was looking in the wrong state altogether!

Kumar pointed out that there was a Lashkar Mohalla in Mysore City, Karnataka [ Images ].

"That seemed to make sense because the boy spoke and understood Kannada," Nakka told Rediff.com over the telephone from Vellore on Wednesday.

So when he visited Fazlu he asked the boy if he ate ragi. The young boy said yes.

Ragi is a cereal popular in Karnataka. Known as nachni in Marathi, ragi is not part of the Maharashtrian staple diet. Dosas made out of ragi are available only in certain south Indian restaurants and its laddoos sold as 'health food' in select stores in Mumbai.

It was increasingly becoming clear to Nakka that the boy was not from Mumbai but rather from some place in Karnataka.

Recalling the series of events Nakka said, "Some RPF constables found him at Jolarpettai railway station after a Mumbai-bound Mumbai Jayanti Janata Express from Kanyakumari had passed by. They handed him over to a local NGO who then brought him to us (the CWC)."

When Nakka sat with the boy, it didn't take him long to figure out that it would be a while before Fazlu would find his way back home.

Adding to the confusion was the little fellow's disclosure that he had changed trains before ending up in Jolarpettai that morning.

Nakka described the boy as being "a loving child who is confident, well adjusting and does his namaz at seven every evening without fail."

"He seems to have adjusted to his new surroundings but he misses home and wants to go back to his parents. He tells us that it's Ramzan and misses being with his family at this time of the year."

The government reception home you are told shifted to its present location about a year ago and has a capacity to accommodate up to 60 children at any given point.

Besides Fazlu it housed four other children. The families of two children have been tracked down to Assam and Rajasthan [ Images ] respectively and the children will be on their way home. The other two -- who it seems may be here for longer -- were found a couple of weeks ago.

One of them does not have parents; his extended family has turned him over to the CWC being unable to take care of him. The other child is said to be mute and perhaps mentally challenged.

At the reception home, Fazlu spent his time playing and learning maths and other handiwork from a teacher. "It isn't formal education but rather something that will keep him occupied and yet be educational. This isn't supposed to be his permanent home," Nakka pointed out.

Ruby Nakka -- who runs an NGO called Hope House for the protection and care of orphaned children in Vellore -- seems like a man who would like to follow rules but knows that sometimes rules can be cruel.

When the boy was brought to him, he questioned him conscientiously. He has been trying to track the boy's home for the last four months.

Ideally, he would have figured out what state -- if not what city -- the boy had come from. Once that was done, it would be his duty to hand the child over to the relevant CWC who would then take it up from there.

With Fazlu's case things got complicated. "Since we don't know where he came from, we could not send him anywhere," Nakka had said on Wednesday.

The other option Nakka had was putting the boy in foster care or up for adoption. Adoption, he had said earlier, would be the last resort.

"If we manage to find his parents in the meanwhile, his being adopted would make things complicated since it is irrevocable. Foster care seems like a logical choice. But I'd be happiest if we manage to find his parents. Growing up in an organisation isn't the best thing for a child," he had said on Wednesday.

Nakka should know. The US-returned physiotherapist has spent 12 years of his life growing up in such a set-up because his parents couldn't afford to take care of him.

"They had three daughters after me. So I was sent to an organisation where I grew up. I studied physiotherapy at Vellore's Christian Medical College and went to the US. I stayed there for ten years, adopted two daughters and realised it was time for me to come back home."

Today Nakka's Hope House works for the protection and care of orphaned children. He also supports his parents financially and says he has never held any grudge against them for sending him away from home. "They never made me feel like I was dumped. Every time they would come over, they'd make me feel special and wanted. I realised where they were coming from. On the brighter side, I couldn't have got to where I am today had it not been for my upbringing in an organisation."

Nakka confesses that a part of him wishes he had memories of being with his family the way other children did. And so each time he would look at Fazlu in the reception home, Nakka would feel a pang of hurt.

As Eid grew closer, a sense of urgency grew inside Nakka. He knew that it was a time for families to come together and celebrate. And a boy of mere seven should not be alone in a government reception home.

"I was hoping we could find his parents by Eid," he says.

In the wee hours of September 9, Nakka received a phone call.

It was four am and he might have fought the urge to not take it. Nakka had had a long day with journalists from all over the country calling him up for information.

But Ruby Nakka took the call.

On the other line were voices he had hoped to hear for over four months. The boy's parents had called up! They had seen a report on their son on a television new channel. They obtained Nakka's number and called him.

On Thursday morning, the morning before Eid, they travelled to Vellore and saw their son. It was a sight they had possibly given up hopes of seeing. Call it divine intervention or the power of the mass media but what might have seemed impossible had been achieved.

Ruby Nakka will now head out of town. When he returns to Vellore three days later, he will tick off one more thing off his to-do list: 'Reunite Mohammed Fazlu with family -- Done!'

Somewhere near Bengaluru tonight, a seven-year-old boy will have an Iftar meal with his family. Tomorrow he will wear a prayer cap, visit the family mosque, kneel before Allah and offer thanksgiving.


Orphanage: Succour to barren parents

Orphanage: Succour to barren parents

Written by Kunle Awosiyan Thursday, 09 September 2010

In this report by Kunle Awosiyan, infertile couples are no longer crying as adoption of children in orphanages becomes more attractive.

THE joy of every couple is to have a child at least. In this part of the world, it is mandatory for a wife to produce a baby for her husband even if he is not fertile. Many people, including some elite, still see a barren woman as victim of a particular curse or spell, irrespective of her medical fitness.While procreation is the key factor for marriage in this part of the world, it is not so in the Western world where couples may decide to adopt a child even when they are medically fit to produce their own.

To those who believe that couples must have children of their own, barrenness goes beyond biological calculations; it could be inflicted on any of the spouses for reasons best known to the evil doer. However, there had been cases where the barren had been made to give birth through orthodox or traditional medicine.

Adopted Girl returned to Mothers “Shocking” Care

 

Adopted Girl returned to Mothers “Shocking” Care


Posted by Josh on September 9, 2010 · Leave a Comment
A seven year old girl that once lived with her adoptive parents in Portugal has been returned to live with her birth mother. Now, the adoptive parents in Portugal have expressed outrage as they have witnessed the shocking conditions that the girl is now living in since being returned to her mother’s care.
Sandra Zarubina was given away for adoption by her biological mother when she was extremely young and she was then adopted by a family in Portugal. Now, the biological mother has decided that she has changed her mind about the adoption and has claimed the child back. The adoptive parents in Portugal say that the child is now living in shocking conditions and say that the child would have been better off in their care.
Footage has been released of shocking treatment of the child since returning to her biological mother and some of the footage shows the child repeatedly smacked and abused. The girl is also said to be living in much worse conditions than she was when with her adoptive parents and the adoptive parents are hoping to gain access of the child once again.

 



 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1SSC85GRUSk

Immigration Case May Keep Alleged Human Trafficker In Prison

HONOLULU -- KITV4 News has learned federal immigration officials want to detain the man at the center of the largest human trafficking case in U.S. history, which could keep him behind bars even though a federal magistrate in Honolulu ruled Wednesday he could be freed on $1 million bail.

Israeli citizen Mordechai Orian, 45, spent Wednesday night at the Federal Detention Center in Honolulu and may have to remain in custody, because now U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials want to keep him behind bars in a deportation case, sources said. ICE has filed an “immigration detainer” against him, sources said.

ICE had allowed him to remain free pending his appeal of an order from July 2009 deporting him back to Israel. The deportation order was based on five false statements Orian listed on federal forms to bring in foreign workers, claiming he was a U.S. citizen when he wasn’t, a federal prosecutor said. Orian would face a hearing in an immigration court before being locked up on immigration charges.

Orian and five others have been indicted by a federal grand jury for conspiracy to commit human trafficking, after allegedly luring 400 farm laborers to Hawaii and the mainland from Thailand and then mistreating them and not paying them properly.

Wednesday afternoon, federal prosecutors asked U.S. Magistrate Judge Leslie Kobayashi to keep Orian, president of labor recruiting company Global Horizons, at the federal detention center near Honolulu Airport until his trial begins in November on human trafficking charges, claiming he's a flight risk.

OrphanAid Africa urges government to phase out orphanages

OrphanAid Africa urges government to phase out orphanages

September 09, 2010

Accra, Sept. 9, GNA - OrphanAid Africa, a non-governmental organization that supports orphaned children, has advocated for kinship and extended family care systems to replace the institutionalization of children at orphanages.

The international NGO said all over the world, abuse was common in orphanages and called on government to set a deadline to close down all orphanages.

In a statement reacting to recent revelations of abuse at the Osu Children's Home in Accra, the NGO said orphanages were often a cover for child trafficking and called on government to refuse registration of new ones.

CCAI heads to the UK to tackle orphan issues globally

CCAI heads to the UK to tackle orphan issues globally

Posted on September 9, 2010 by ccainstitute

As part of CCAI’s 20/20 Vision Program, I had the privilege of coordinating a congressional delegation to the United Kingdom and Ethiopia during the August recess here on Capitol Hill. Senator Mary Landrieu (D-LA) led the official Congressional delegation and was joined by Ambassador Susan Jacobs, the recently appointed Special Advisor to the Department of State’s Office of Children’s Issues (reporting directly to Secretary Clinton), as well as Mr. Gary Newton, USAID’s Special Advisor for Orphans and Children.

CCAI is honored to be a part of what we believe is essential to moving Orphan and Vulnerable Children (OVC) policy forward in the world by bringing the government sectors together along with the private sectors and faith-based groups. Toward that end, CCAI and Senator Landrieu’s delegation coordinated with the Legatum Institute of London and Buckner Bright Hope of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia and Buckner International of Dallas Texas to create an incredible itinerary to raise awareness of the children around the globe in need of permanent, loving families.

The delegation’s visit to London was graciously hosted by Dr. Jean Geran and Natalie Gonnella at the Legatum Institute, who also launched the fabulous EACH Campaign in March, 2010. Legatum Institute arranged for Senator Landrieu to meet with two Members of Parliament – Mr. Jim Fitzpatrick and Mr. Nick Smith – to discuss the issues surrounding orphans and vulnerable children and the legislative work of the U.S. members of the Congressional Coalition on Adoption toward finding permanency for these children. The meeting was followed by a larger program with a panel of presenters from the United Kingdom and United States, including Secretary Andrew Mitchell, the U.K.’s Secretary of State for International Development.

American couple allowed to adopt slow-learner Indian kid

American couple allowed to adopt slow-learner Indian kid


Mittwoch, 8. September 2010 11:10:55


by IANS ( Leave a comment )
New Delhi, Sep 8 (IANS) The Supreme Court Wednesday allowed an American couple to adopt a slow-learner child Anil after an expert committee of doctors told it that the prospective parents were eminently suitable for adoption.
The committee told the court that the adopting parents - Craig Lallen Coates and Cynthia Ann Coates - were financially and economically sound and the child would be extremely comfortable with them.
The committee was appointed following a suggestion by solicitor general and amicus curae Gopal Subramanium to the court in the course of the last hearing Aug 30.
It told the apex court bench of Justice Markandey Katju and Justice T.S. Thakur that the couple was fully aware of what the family was required to do for the upbringing of Anil.
It noted that Cynthia was suited for Anil’s upbringing as her husband Craig is also a slow-learner by birth. Cynthia, who knew about Craig’s slow-learning before marriage, took good care of him, the committee said.


More at : American couple allowed to adopt slow-learner Indian kid 
 
 

Campagn Contributions orian Mordechai

 

Nine to probe abuse at Osu Children's Home

Nine to probe abuse at Osu Children's Home

Last Updated: Tuesday, 7 September 2010, 9:16 GMT

The Minister of Employment and Social Welfare, Mr E.T Mensah, Monday inaugurated a nine-member committee to investigate the issues of neglect, abuse and corruption at the Osu Children's Home as alleged in a documentary by Anas Aremeyaw Anas, a journalist.

It is chaired by Mr Antwi-Boasiako Sekyere, the Deputy Minister of Employment and Social Welfare.

Other members are Assistant Commissioner of Police (ACP) Elizabeth Dassah, National Co-ordinator of the Domestic Violence and Victims Support Unit (DOVVSU); Ms Valerie Amatey, Attorney General's Department; Ms Mariama Yahaya, a representative of the Ministry of Women and Children's Affairs, and Mr Kofi Kumah, Ghana Coalition on the Rights of the Child.

Pilot Project Helps Ethiopian Orphans Avoid Overseas Adoption

Pilot Project Helps Ethiopian Orphans Avoid Overseas Adoption

Peter Heinlein | Bantu, Ethiopia 07 September 2010 .

charity are teaming up on an experimental project to help orphans thrive in their home countries rather than be put up for adoption overseas. From the town of Bantu, our correspondent reports that the U.S. government is studying the project as Ethiopia becomes the nation of choice for American families seeking international adoptions.

Hundreds of Bantu's tiniest children stand in a muddy field at the Bright Hope Education Center, singing a welcome song to a team of foreign visitors led by U.S. Senator Mary Landrieu of Louisiana.

Three years ago, Bantu was little more than a collection of huts connected to the outside world by a footpath. Its population was decimated by drought and disease. Countless orphans were left to fend for themselves.