No fans or beds in ‘hostel’ where minors stayed: Cops

Ghaziabad: Police on Thursday booked the owners of a meat processing and export company two days after 55 minors — the youngest among them 8 years old — were rescued from the firm’s abattoir in Dasna.The company is registered in the name of Mohmad Yasin Qureshi, a resident of Hapur. His wife and son are directors in the firm.Cops said Qureshi was booked under sections of the Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Act, 1986. The complaint was filed by the district child protection officer Jitendra Kumar at the Masuri police station. TOI reported on May 30 about Ghaziabad police, non-profit Mission Mukti Foundation and officials of National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) rescuing 55 minors from the meat factory in Dasna on Tuesday. The team found minors, including 31 girls, slicing meat or involved in packaging and weighing processes. Police suspect all the children working in the factory were trafficked from Bihar, West Bengal and UP. The case came to light after a 17-year-old girl, who was brought from her hometown in West Bengal to NCR on the promise of marriage, was rescued by Mission Mukti Foundation in April. She had told the NGO that more children were working at the factory. On Thursday, a senior police officer told TOI that the rescued children told them they were made to live inside the factory premises without basic facilities.“During the investigation, police discovered that inside the slaughterhouse, a hostel had been made where the minors were living. The conditions were appalling. There were no fans or beds. Only 25 mattresses had been provided for all of them to sleep on. Some of the children used their clothes to sleep on. The hostel was extremely dirty,” the officer said.The children have been sent to shelter homes, and tests are ongoing to determine their exact age.Ghaziabad’s labour enforcement officer Rupali said on Thursday that tests for 16 children were completed. “On Friday, tests for the remaining children will be carried out. After that, we will take action against the company. The labour department has started making a report that will be sent to chief judicial magistrate as soon as possible,” she said.

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