Nun who ran city orphanage held, sent to judicial custody

Baretto had earlier denied the charges

Baretto had earlier denied the charges

GURUGRAM: Sister Lily Baretto, who ran a shelter home in Gurgaon for years and was awarded in 2013 by the district administration for her work in the field of child care, was arrested in Delhi on Sunday and sent to judicial custody for 14 days by a city court on Monday.

Sister Baretto, a social worker who ran the orphanage, Ujjwal Niketan, for nearly two decades before it was shut down earlier this year, had been booked on charges of illegally handing over two children for adoption, and for "cruel treatment" of inmates at the orphanage. She had denied the charges in an earlier interaction with TOI.

An FIR had been filed against her at Sector 10 police station. Her anticipatory bail plea filed in the district court had been denied in July. Charges of human trafficking were later added, according to the police. Baretto has also been accused of cruelty to children by making them work at the orphanage (under section 75 of the Juvenile Justice Act) and section 420 (cheating) of the IPC in the FIR registered against her.

These charges were registered after an investigation was launched into Baretto when a team headed by the District Legal Services Authority and chief judicial magistrate found irregularities in her paperwork, after which one of Ujjwal Niketan in Sector 4 was shut.

Its occupants, among them three teenaged girls brought up by the nun, were moved to other homes.

Baretto was accused of "trafficking" after she sent two children for adoption to a Mangalorean couple. The children's parents had died and they had been brought to her by their aunt. She was accused of not following due procedure by informing the Child Welfare committee about the adoption. Later, the couple returned the kids.

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must be harshly punished if found guilty by the court.

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Baretto's counsel had told TOI earlier that while the "correctness" of giving away the two minor girls for adoption using a "single adoption deed" might be debated, it cannot be used to attribute malice on the part of Baretto, adding the two girls were siblings, who were placed at the shelter home by their aunt who could not take care of them.

The lawyers also said the children were never entrusted to the orphanage by the CWC, and so by giving them away for adoption, Baretto had acted in accordance with guidelines for "rehabilitation and social re-integration" as mentioned in Section 39 of the Juvenile Justice Act.

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