In an attempt to maintain their records, the Child Protection and Welfare Bureau has taken to kidnapping children playing outside their houses, City 42 reported on Monday.
According to details, the bureau officers have been holding ‘raids’ in different areas of the cities to take children to the bureau office in Township to meet their targets for different projects that are being funded by the Punjab government and other international donors.
In one of the most recent projects worth Rs 180 million, the CPWB has set targets that include enrolment of 2,000 working children below the age of 14 in non-formal schools and of 2,000 higher age group children in the literacy cum skill training classes. These ‘targets’ require for CPWB to ensure the ‘presence’ of these children in the centres and instead of looking for real beggars, child labourers and orphans, the CPWB has resorted to kidnapping children who are being taken care of by their parents and already have a house to live in.
The parents of children who are being kidnapped by the CPWB also held a protest and said, “Our children are not orphans nor are they lost. The bureau is kidnapping them and that is causing a lot of distress to us. We request the higher authorities to look into the matter.”