NEW DELHI: The NHRC on Thursday said it has issued notices to the Madhya Pradesh government and the state's police chief over reports that even 18 days after a six-year-old girl went missing from an underbridge in Bhopal, police have "no answers".
Reportedly, this is not just one case of disappearance, as over 3,400 women and girls have gone missing in the state during the last three years, as per the data of the Madhya Pradesh police.
"Allegedly, the CCTV networks are patchy, rapid-response teams are missing in action, and there is no coordination between the units," the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) said in a statement.
The rights panel said it has taken suo-motu cognisance of a media report that even after 18 days since the girl went missing from an underbridge in Bhopal's Koh-e-Fiza area, police have "no answers".
"Reportedly, the missing girl's homeless mother with eight children suspects the involvement of one of the relatives in the disappearance of her daughter, but the police is not conducting a fair investigation, and no arrests have been made in the matter to date," the statement said.
The commission observed that the contents of the news report, if true, raise a serious issue of violation of human rights.
Therefore, it has issued notices to the chief secretary and director general of police of Madhya Pradesh, seeking a detailed report in two weeks, the rights panel said.
According to the media report, published on April 25, a drive under the name of "Operation Muskan" launched last year by the state police to rescue and rehabilitate the missing girls "has not shown any results", the commission said.