A national level meeting on child protection was organised in New Delhi on Tuesday for monitoring Child Care Institutions (CCIs) across states and to deliberate upon various aspects of child protection.
The first meeting for the year, termed "National Consultation on Child Protection", was chaired by Secretary, Ministry of Women and Child Development, who took stock of the efforts made by states and union territories (UT's) regarding improvements in the CCI.
All the states and UTs shared the action taken in respect of improving security arrangements, filling vacancies in Child Welfare Committees (CWC) and Juvenile Justice Board (JJB) and other initiatives taken by them. It was noted during the deliberations that the states and UTs have closed a number of institutions last year on account of various inadequacies.
The meeting was attended by the representatives of 33 states and UTs, senior officers from Women and Child Development Department or Social Welfare Department of the state and senior nodal Police officer (for Women and Children) from the states and UTs.
Representatives of National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) along with representatives from 17 State Commission for Protection of Child Rights (SCPCR), Central Adoption Resource Authority (CARA), National Institute of Public Cooperation and Child Development (NIPCCD) and Childline India Foundation (CIF) were also present at the meeting.
Some of the states such as Andhra Pradesh informed that they have started grading institutions. The states reported that they have started conducting background checks of organisations running CCIs and police verification of staff of CCI is also underway.